FORESTRY 



CHAPTER I 



HISTORIC SKETCH OF THE DEVELOPMENT 

 OF FORESTRY 



i. In the Most Remote Periods 



To the work of Romans, writing at the dawn of ancient 

 history, we are indebted for a description of several 

 European forest districts. But there is an unwritten history 

 equally eloquent in the timber of lake-dwellings and other 

 primitive habitations, as well as the remains found in peat 

 mosses. These latter tell us something of the distribution 

 and extent of the forests at a period still more remote than 

 that dealt with by historians. By searching into the origin of 

 the names of places also much light has been shed on this 

 subject. Thus we have the terminations holt (a wood es- 

 pecially the haunt of wild animals), toft (a grove), shaw, 

 scau, hurst, wood, and moot. Then many place-names are 

 compounded with the names of species of trees ; thus, of 

 British origin, derry (the Oak) in Londonderry ; sale (from 

 sahl, the Willow) in Salehurst ; and of Saxon derivation, 

 aec (the Oak) in Acton ; withlg (the Willow) in Withington, 

 cesce (the Ash) in Ashton, Askham, and many others. 1 



Evidence of this kind proves that there has been but little 

 change in our forest flora since very ancient times. The 



1 See Flavell Edmunds' Traces of History in the Names of Places. Tr. 



