CHAPTER IX 



CLASSIFICATION 



PRE-LINNEAN botanists of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries 

 generally adopted the classification of the cultivated wheats suggested by 

 Columella, dividing them into two sections, namely : 



I. Species of Triticum, or wheats whose ears have a tough rachis and 

 grain so loosely invested by the chaff that they fall out when the ears are 

 thrashed, and 



II. Species of Zea, whose ears possess a fragile rachis, which breaks 

 into short lengths, and whose grains are so firmly enclosed by the glumes 

 that they are separated from the latter with difficulty. 



Those comprising the Zea section are at the present day often spoken 

 of as " spelt" wheats, the term " spelt " being 'used in a generic sense 

 and embracing Small Spelt (T. monococcum), Emmer (T. dicoccum), and 

 Common Spelt (T. Spelta). 



Linnaeus, however, placed all the cultivated wheats under the single 

 genus Triticum, of which in the first edition of his Species Plantarum 

 (1753) he mentions five species, viz. : 



1. T, aestivum (Bearded Spring Wheat). 



2. T. hybernum (Beardless Winter Wheat). 



3. T. turgidum. 



4. T. Spelta Zea dicoccos vel spelta major of C. Bauhin. 



5. T. monococcum Zea Briza dicta, vel monococcus germanica of C. Bauhin. 



In the second edition of his Species Plantarum (1764) he added T. 

 polonicum, adopting Plukenet's specific name. 



Later in the Supplement (1781) his son introduced the species T. 

 composition, a form of T. turgidum with proliferous ears (2, Fig. 160). 



In 1786 Lamarck (Encyclop. Me'thodique, vol. ii. p. 554) recognised five 

 species, viz. : 



i. T. sativum, embracing the Linnean species T. aestivum, T. hybernum, 

 and T. turgidum. 



2. T. compositum, L. fils. 



3. T. polonicum, L,. 



4. T. Spelta, L. 



5. T. monococcum, L. 



