PLANTS CULTIVATED FOR THEIR SEEDS. 381 



as mere varieties. Aitchison also had only seen the sor- 

 ghum cultivated. The absence of a Sanskrit name also 

 renders the Indian origin very doubtful. Bretschneider, 

 on the other hand, says the sorghum is indigenous in 

 China, although he says that ancient Chinese authors 

 have not spoken of it. It is true that he quotes a name, 

 common at Pekin, kao-liang (tall millet), which also 

 applies to Holcus saccharatiis, and to which it is better 

 suited. 



The sorghum has not been found among the remains 

 of the lake-dwellings of Switzerland and Italy. The 

 Greeks never spoke of it. Pliny's phrase ^ about a miliiini 

 introduced into Italy from India in his time has been 

 supposed to refer to the sorghum ; but it was a taller plant, 

 perhaps Holcus saccharatus. The sorghum has not been 

 found in a natural state in the tombs of ancient Egypt. 

 Dr. Hannerd thought he recognized it in some crushed 

 seeds brought by Rosellini from Thebes ; ^ but Mr. Birch, 

 the keeper of Egyptian antiquities in the British Museum, 

 has more recently declared that the species has not been 

 found in the ancient tombs.^ Pickering says he recog- 

 nized its leaves mixed with those of the papyrus. He 

 says he also saw paintings of it ; and Leipsius has copies 

 of drawings which he, as well as Unger and Wilkinson, 

 takes to be the dourra of modern cultivation.'* The height 

 and the form of the ear are undoubtedly those of the 

 sorghum. It is possible that this species is the dochan, 

 once mentioned in the Old Testament ^ as a cereal from 

 which bread was made ; yet the modern Ai^abic word 

 dokkn refers to the sweet sorghum. 



Common names tell us nothing, either from their lack 

 of meaning, or because in many cases the same name 

 has been applied to the different kinds of panicum and 

 sorghum. I can find none which is certain in the 

 ancient languages of India or Western Asia, which 



1 Pliny, Hist, lib. xviii. c. 7. 



* Quoted by UBger, Die Pflanzen des Alien Egyptens, p. 34. 



' S. Birch, in Wilkinson, Man. and Oust, of Anc. Egyptians, 1878, vol. ii. 

 p. 427. 



* Lepsius' drawings are reproduced by Unger and by Wilkinson. 

 5 Ezek. iv. 9. 



