214 STURTEVANT S NOTES ON EDIBLE PLANTS 



The word " squash," in its early use, we may conclude, applied to those varieties 

 of cucurbits which furnish a summer vegetable and was carefully distinguished from the 

 pumpkin. Kalm,' in the eighteenth century, distinguishes between pumpkins, gourds 

 and squashes. The latter are the early sorts; the gourd includes the late sorts useful for 

 winter supplies; and under the term pompion, or melon, the latter name and contem- 

 porary use gives the impression of roundness and size, are included sorts grown for 

 stock. Jonathan Carver,* soon after Kalm, gives indication of the confusion now 

 existing in the definition of what constitutes a pimipkin and a squash when he says " the 

 melon or pumpkin, which by some are called squashes," and he names among other 

 forms the same variety, the crookneck or craneneck, as he calls it, which Kalm classed 

 among gourds. 



At the present time, the word squash is used only in America, gourds, pumpkins, and 

 marrows being the eqmvalent English names, and the American use of the word is so con- 

 fusing that it can only be defined as applying to those varieties of cuctirbits which are 

 grown in gardens for table use; the word pumpkin applies to those varieties grown in fields 

 for stock ptirposes; and the word gourd to those ornamental forms with a woody rind 

 and bitter flesh, or to the Lagenaria. 



The form of cucurbit now so generally known as Bush or Summer Squash is correctly 

 figured in 1673 by Pancovius,' under the name of Melopepo clypeatus Tab. What may 

 be the fruit, was figured by Lobel,* 1591; by Dodonaeus,^ 1616; and similar fruit with the 

 vine and leaf, by Dalechamp,* 1587; Gerarde,' 1597; Dodonaeus, 1616; and by J. Bauhin,' 

 1651. By Ray,^ 1686, it is called in the vernacular " the Buckler," or " Simnel-Gourd." 

 This word cymling or cymbling, used at the present day in the southern states for the 

 Scalloped Bush Squash in particular, was used in 1648 in A Description oj New Albion 

 but spelled " Symnels." Jefferson i' wrote the word " cymling." In 1675, Thomson, in 

 a poem entitled New England's Crisis, uses the word " cimnel," and distinguishes it from 

 the pumpkin. There is no clue as to the origin of the word, but it was very possibly of 

 aboriginal origin, as its use has not been transferred to Europe. In England this squash 

 is called Crown Gotird and Custard Marrow; in the United States generally, it is the 

 Scalloped Squash, from its shape, though locally, Cymling or Patty-pan, the latter name 

 derived from the resemblance to a crimped pan used in the kitchen for baking cakes. It 

 was first noticed in Europe in the sixteenth century and has the following synonymy: 



Cucurbita laciniata. Dalechamp 1:618. 1587. 



Melopepo latior clypeiformis. Loh. Icon. 1:642. 1591. 



'Kalm, P. Trav. No. Amer. 1:271, 272. 1772. 

 'Carver, J. Trav. No. Amer. 525. 1778. 

 ' Pancovius Herbarium No. 920. 1673. 



* Lobel Icon, i : 642 . 1 59 1 . 



' Dodonaeus Pempt. 667. 1616. 



Dalechamp Hist. Gen. PI. (Lugd.) 1:618. 1587. 

 'Gerarde, J. Herb. 774. 1597. 



"Bauhin, J. Hist. PI. 2:224. 1651. 

 oRny Hist. PI. 1:648. 1686. 

 "Jefferson Notes Va. 1803. 



