3' 



CHAPTER IV. 



HISTORY AND LITERATURE. 



A WIDE interval in the literatnre of the genus separates the class.cal references 

 A ,„ Crocns from what has been written from the sixteenth century downwards. 

 In later times, the history of Crocuses may be said to have recommenced de novo 



about the end of the sixteenth century. c Wa ™m at the 



The various ancient herbaria consolidated in the Herbanum Sloneanum at the 

 British Museum, at the end of the seventeenth and the early par. of the eighteenth 

 centuries, probably contain the earliest records. 



It i, evident from these that several species of Crocus had been long in 

 cultivation before the early part of the seventeenth century! for they contain, besides 

 pes from wild sources, numerous varieties of Crocus aureus which are now known 

 o be horTcultura. forms. The Herbarium of Dr. Uvedale, collected in the seven- 

 enUr century, contains such a se, of orange varieties, under the rith , J— 

 Croci verm, and Crocus scoticus forming a complete series of all the varieties _oi 

 cZ* aureus a, present Known: amongst which sulphurs sulpkureus palUus, 

 ITJlreus situs can be identified. These were certainly not wild specie 

 "ceny introduced, but degenerated horticultural forms of C aureus exactly .dent, 

 wttfi those we now cultivate, implying a far-back cultivation of the wild Crocus 

 „ „„, Dr. Uvedale's herbarium also contains an undoubted specimen of C. Clusu 

 T d r*e name of C. purfiureus, gathered at Lisbon in 1660; of C. nuAficrus, under 

 the name of mtoJ* purpureus; of C. saHvus; of C. versicolor, under he name 

 of « I Zs ,,,&,■ and many forms of C. vemus, which may have been d.rectly. derived 

 ™ wild source. The tortus Siccus of Hermann Boerhaav^ probat y collect^ 

 at the close of the seventeenth century, contains C. so/wus, labelled The right sort 

 of Saffron » also a species labelled C. autumnalis sui-ccerul, which is apparently 

 C. H^n,s; several varieties of C. vemus, and a Crocus under the name of vcrvus 

 latiflorus flavus, which is probably C. aureus. 



