ENQUIRY INTO PLANTS, IV. vi. 2-4 



sea-plants called ' fir ' ' fig ' < oak ' ' vine ' ' palm.' ] 

 Of these some are found close to land, others 

 in the deep sea, others equally in both positions. 

 And some have many forms, as seaweed, some but 

 one. Thus of seaweed there is the broad-leaved 

 kind, riband-like 2 and green in colour, which some 

 call ' green-weed' and others ' girdle-weed.' This 

 has a root which on the outside is shaggy, but the 

 inner part is made of several coats, and it is fairly 

 long and stout, like kromyogeteion (a kind of onion). 



3 Another kind has hair-like leaves like fennel, 

 and is not green but pale yellow ; nor has it a stalk, 

 but it is, as it were, erect in itself; this grows on 

 oyster-shells and stones, not, like the other, attached 

 to the bottom ; but both are plants of the shore, 

 and the hair-leaved kind grows close to land, and 

 sometimes is merely washed over by the sea 4 ; while 

 the other is found further out. 



Again in the ocean about the pillars of Heracles 

 there is a kind 5 of marvellous size, they say, which 

 is larger, about a palmsbreadth. 6 This is carried into 

 the inner sea along with the current from the outer 

 sea, and they call it ' sea-leek ' (riband-weed) ; 

 and in this sea in some parts it grows higher than 

 a man's waist. It is said to be annual and to come 

 up at the end of spring, and to be at its best in 

 summer, and to wither in autumn, while in winter it 

 perishes and is thrown up on shore. Also, they say, 

 all the other plants of the sea become weaker and 

 feebler in winter. These then are, one may say, the 



4 i.e. grows above low water mark. 



5 See Index : <f>C/cos (2). 



i.e. the 'leaf: the comparison is doubtless with T?> 

 , 2 ; ws UMVAld.; ^ VV. after Sch.'s conj. 



33 1 



