CAPRIFICATION OF THE FIG. THE 
was introduced into Greece, as has already been shown, and whether 
we presume that the first introduced fig race required caprification or 
not, it follows that this caprification was not and could not have been 
invented in Greece nor in any other country where the caprifig was 
not originally wild, and wild at the time the first figs requiring caprifi- 
cation were grown under cultivation. If the self-setting fig race had 
been the one first introduced into Greece, then the Greeks would 
never have thought of caprification, or if some uncommon genius had 
done so, he would have been obliged to go to distant countries in order 
to see, find, and bring home the caprifig, of which he could otherwise 
have had no possible knowledge. The discovery of caprification in 
Greece, as has been held by the majority of investigators except 
Solms-Laubach, would be as improbable and as impossible as the dis- 
covery of the placer mining of gold in a country where native gold 
oceurs only in solid veins of ore. 
Caprification must have originated in a country where the caprifig 
was wild. But particulars about the discovery are not forthcoming, 
the records having been forever lost. Even in the oldest books of the 
Semitic races no mention is made of any process which can with any 
certainty be explained as referring to caprification. As is stated else- 
where, in the Book of Amos we read of ‘‘bdétés schiqmim,” which 
means ‘‘one who operates on the wild fig.” But if this operation 
refers to caprification, or to the oiling of the fig, or to the yet com- 
mon and necessary practice of cutting the ‘‘sycamore figs” with a 
knife in order to give an opportunity to their inquilines to escape, 
will always remain an uncertainty, with some probability that the last 
explanation is the correct one. A circumstance which makes it prob- 
able that caprification was, in very ancient times, practiced in Asia 
is the fact that Syria is yet the country which grows principally or 
almost exclusively figs requiring caprification in order to set and 
mature. In nearly all other countries other, though inferior, varieties 
have been or are being substituted—varieties which mature without 
pollination and caprification. 
For the oldest written record of caprification we must go to the 
oldest Greek writers. Aristotle, the teacher of Alexander, and the 
best-informed scholar of ancient times, describes caprification in very . 
much the same way as it is practiced to this day. Aristotle explains 
the effects of caprification through the bite of the wasp, which causes 
the air to enter the fig, etc. He, as well as all writers for a period of 
two thousand years, or until the time of Linnzeus, were unable to give 
a true explanation of the effects of caprification. 
The most minute description of caprification as practiced and under- 
stood by the ancients is given by Theophrast. Not only does he cor- 
rectly describe the process of caprification, but he informs us of 
certain facts of great interest. One of these is that there are two 
races of figs, one which requires caprification in order to set fruit, and 
