Platanus 619 



History of the Cultivated Planes 



The oriental plane was introduced into Italy from Greece about 390 b,c. ; and 

 Hehn ' gives a full account of the classical allusions to the tree.' It came into 

 England* some time before 1562. In Turner's Herball, published in that year, a 

 figure is given, and the author states : "I have sene the leves of that Platanus that 

 groweth in Italy and two very yong trees in England which were called there Playn 

 trees, whose leves in all poyntes were lyke unto the leves of the Italian Playn tree. 

 And it is doubtles that these two trees were either brought out of Italy or of som 

 farr countrie beyond Italy where unto the freres monkes and chanones went a 

 pilgrimage." 



The American plane, P. occidentalis, was introduced into England by 

 Tradescant,* in whose garden two small plants were growing in 1636, when Johnson 

 published his edition of Gerard's Herball. It was undoubtedly in cultivation in the 

 eighteenth century, as a specimen from a tree cultivated at Kew in 1781 exists in the 

 British Museum ; but another specimen from the Chelsea Physic Garden, dated 1789 

 and labelled P. occidentalis, is undoubtedly P. acerifolia. The figure given in 

 Evelyn's Sylva of P. occidentalis really represents P. acerifolia. Similarly Loudon's 

 description and figure of the American plane are inaccurate, and in part refer to 

 P. acerifolia. The confusion between these two forms is thus shown to have begun 

 early, and has lasted until quite recently ; and it is probable that most of the 

 references to the occidental plane in this country and on the continent of Europe 

 refer to P. acerifolia. 



Platanus acerifolia was first distinguished by Tournefort* in 1703. Miller,* in 

 1 73 1, gives an account of three kinds of plane: P. orientalis vera, P. occidentalis, 

 and P. aceris folio ; but he was unaware of the real distinctions between the two 

 latter, attributing to P. occidentalis the property of being easily propagated by 

 cuttings, whereas it is P. acerifolia of which this is true. He asserts that his 

 P. aceris folio is only a seminal variety of P. orientalis. 



BoUe'' states that Bourgeau found considerable forests of P. acerifolia in Lycia. 

 This statement has not been confirmed, and there is no evidence of the occurrence 

 anywhere of this form in the wild state. The difierence between it and the wild 

 form of P. orientalis (var. insularis) is mainly in habit, and taking into account the 

 variability of the leaves on the wild tree, no two of which are alike in the specimens 

 which I have examined, there is little doubt that P. acerifolia is a seedling variety of 

 P. orientalis, which has been fixed in cultivation. Intermediate forms between it 

 and the ordinary typical variety are not unusual. Bolle states that seedlings of 

 acerifolia often exhibit the characters of typical orientalis. Further experiments on 

 this point are desirable, as well as a thorough investigation of the range of variation 



1 Kulturpflanzen, ed. 6, p. 283. 



2 The Romans planted it in their gardens for shade ; Ovid calls it genialis, and Horace caUbs because it did not support 

 the vine. 



' It was probably introduced into France in Provence about the same time. Cf. Le Jardin, 1896, pp. 116, 162. 



* Cf. Parkinson, Theat. Bot. 1427 (1640). ' Coroll. 41 {1703). 



Card. Diet. ed. i {1731). ^ Gard. Chron. i. 564 (1876). 



Ill Z 



