CHAPTEE IV. 



GEEEN VEGETABLES (continued). 

 THE CABBAGE TRIBE. 



Brassica* oleracea, L. (Cruci ferae), is a native on the chalk cliffs of 

 the coasts of England (figs. 11, 12) and of Wales, the Channel Islands, 

 and W. and S. Europe. It has no wild varieties, but innumerable 

 sorts have arisen under cultivation. It supplies a nutritious diet from 

 the roots, stems, and branches, as well as from the leaf -buds, leaves, 

 and unexpanded inflorescences. 



The origin of the name " cabbage "is as follows : In the sixteenth 

 century the French name of the plant was choulx, " as if we wished to 

 speak of the stems, Latin, caules, by which also Brassica is called by 

 Cato, since scarcely any herb grows larger in the stem. The ' choulz 

 cabuz ' are -the most delicate for eating." f This appears to have been 

 the popular French name for the Crambe capitata or " Cabbage cole " 

 of Gerard. In modern French the first word is retained, so that chou 

 alone signifies the cabbage ; while in English this is dropped, and we 

 have turned the second into cabbage (formerly spelt " cabbidge "). 

 Cabuz is derived from capus, which meant in French " round-headed," 

 being itself derived from the Italian capuccio, a ' 'little head," a 

 diminutive of capo, Latin caput. 



Root. The only instance of the roots being cultivated was a variety 

 called Napo-brassica, first mentioned by C. Bauhin (" Pinax," 1671), 

 and described as being like a carrot or turnip and cultivated in the 

 colder parts of Bavaria, and especially on the mountains near Bohemia. 

 It was called " Dorsen " or " Dorschen." 



Tournefort described this, but only in the words of Bauhin, and 

 makes no mention of its being grown in his day (1730). 



A turnip -like form is cultivated in France, differing from the 

 Kohl-rabi in that the leaves arise from the summit only, so that it 

 resembles a turnip, the globular part belonging to the root. It is 

 known as Chou-Navet. I 



* With regard to the derivation of the word Brassica, Hermann Boerhaave 

 (1727) says it is from airb TOV ftpdiv t Lat. vorare ["to devour"], quia haec 

 planta locum tenet inter herbas edules, i.e., " because it holds a place among 

 edible plants." But there is no such Greek verb. There is Ppdcro-civ, i fipdfctvv, 

 "to boil," and fiippwffKftv, "to eat," as well as the word avaftp6^eiv t from an 

 obsolete verb, avafip6x<D, "to swallow" or "gulp down." 



t De Re Hortenzi Libellus, by Carolus Stephanus, 1545. 



+ It is figured in Les Legumes et Les Fruits, Paris, 1893. 



