W77 

 (leaf 2) 



glo-Saxon streaw'benge (streafw, straw, and berige, berry) , which, in 

 turn, they say is so named from the resemblance of the plant runners 

 to straws. Some authors (more plausibly) state that the Anglo- 

 Saxon name means stray berry, because the runners cause the plants 

 to stray from their original location. 2 The statement often heard, 

 that strawberries are so named from being strawed to keep the berries 

 clean is a fallacy, as the name of these plants obviously far antedates 

 their cultivation. 



These species are relatively unimportant as forage, generally rating 

 as practically worthless or poor; they are grazed to a limited ex- 

 tent by livestock, except horses. Certain species, however, rank in 

 some localities as fair in palatability for sheep and cattle, deer and 

 elk. The fruits are relished by birds and rodents. The Indians have 

 long esteemed these berries as a delicacy ; in fact, most persons find 

 time to linger for a few minutes in any patch of ripe wild straw- 

 berries to partake of the small but very appetizing fruits. In the 

 words of quaint old Dr. Boteler (as quoted by Izaak Walton in his 

 Compleat Angler), "Doubtless God could have made a better berry, 

 but doubtless God never did." 



The records fail to show that strawberries were cultivated by 

 the Romans, who knew these plants exclusively as wild fruit. Straw- 

 berries were cultivated in France as early as the fourteenth cen- 

 tury, 2 3 but it was not until the sixteenth century that frequent men- 

 tion is made of this table delicacy by various European writers, who 

 refer both to the wild fruits and to those cultivated in gardens. 4 

 The Flemish botanist, de 1'Obel (1538-1616), after whom our plant 

 genus Lobelia is named, was apparently the first to give a distinct 

 name to a cultivated variety of strawberry when, in 1576, he desig- 

 nated a variety of the Hautbois strawberry (F. moscha'ta, syn. 

 F. elaftior), having a large pale-colored berry, as Le Chapiron (or, 

 later, Chapiton). 4 The early American colonists were much im- 

 pressed by the abundance as well as the large size and sweet, agree- 

 able flavor of the wild Virginia strawberry (F. Virginia? no) , which 

 was superior to any of the three native European species; Virginia 

 strawberry was forthwith introduced into England, where it became 

 widely known and was improved under cultivation. In the mean- 

 time, the large, firm-fruited Chiloe strawberry (F. chiloen' sis} , a 

 native of the Pacific coast from Alaska to Chile, was introduced into 

 France from Chile in 1712 by a French officer named Frezier. Straw- 

 berry culture was not begun in North America on any scale until 

 about 1800, because of the abundant supply of appetizing wild ber- 

 ries. There were, however, collections in private gardens of English- 

 improved varieties of Virginia strawberry, Chiloe strawberry, the 

 "pine" strawberry (F. cmanas'sa, syn. F. grandiflo'ra), and the na- 

 tive European species, i. e., alpine strawberry (F. ves'ca), often 



2 Bobbins, W. W., and Ramaley, F. PLANTS USEFUL TO MAN. 428 pp., illus. Phila- 

 delphia. 1933. 



8 Fletcher, S. W. THE STRAWBERRY IN NORTH AMERICA: HISTORY, ORIGIN, BOTANY, AND 

 BREEDING. 234 pp., illus. New York. 1917. 



* Sturtevant E L NOTES ON THE HISTORY OF THE STRAWBERRY. Mass. Hort. Soc. 

 Trans. (1888), Pt. 1:191-204. 1888. 



