1868 



TULIPA 



TULIPA 



from Turkey. This is one of the main reasons for 

 believing that T. suaveolens is not native to southern 

 Europe. At all events it is clear that T. suaveolens 

 has played an important part in the evolution of the 

 garden Tulip, the Due van Thol class being generally 

 credited to this source. The distinctions between T. 

 suaveolens and T. Gesneriana given below are those of 

 Baker, but they do not hold at the present day. It is 

 impossible to refer any given variety with satisfaction 

 to either type. Some writers have said that the leaves 

 of T. suaveolens are shorter and broader than those of 

 T. Gesneriana. This char- 

 acter also fails. All grades 

 of pubescence are present. 

 Some pubescent plants 

 have long leaves and odor- 

 less flowers. Others have 

 short, glabrous leaves and 

 fragrant flowers. 



For practical purposes it 

 may be said that most of 

 the common garden Tu- 

 lips, at least the late-flow- 

 ering ones, are T. Gesner- 

 iana, while many of the 

 early-flowering kinds, e.g., 

 the Due van Thol class, 

 are supposed to be derived 

 from T. suaveolens. It is 

 impossible to press much 

 nearer the truth, as botany 

 is not an exact science and 

 the prototypes of the old 

 garden favorites cannot be 

 known completely and pre- 

 cisely. 



Early History. The 

 first Tulip seeds planted 

 by Europeans were sent or 

 brought to Vienna in 1554 

 by Busbequius, the Aus- 

 trian ambassador before 

 the Sultan of Turkey. 

 Busbequius reported that 

 he first saw the flowers in 

 a garden near Constanti- 

 nople, and that he had to 

 pay dearly for them. After 

 the introduction of seed to 

 Vienna the Tulip became 

 rapidly disseminated over 

 Europe, both by home- 

 grown seed and by new 

 importations from Turkey. 

 In 1559 Gesner first saw 

 the flower at Augsburg, 

 and it is mainly upon his 

 descriptions and pictures 

 that the species T. Ges- 

 neriana was founded. One 

 of the earliest enthusiasts 

 was the herbalist Clusius, 

 who propagated Tulips on 

 a rather large scale. Fig. 

 2593. He did not introduce 

 the Tulip into Holland, 



but the appearance of his 

 specimens in 1591 did 

 much to stimulate the in- 

 terest in the flower in that 

 country. The best of Clusius' plants were stolen from 

 him, as the admirers of the Tulip were unwilling to pay 

 the high prices he demanded. After this theft the prop- 

 agation of the Tulip proceeded rapidly in Holland and 

 the flower soon became a great favorite. The production 

 of new varieties became a craze throughout the Nether- 

 lands, culminating in the celebrated "tulipomania" 

 which began in 1634. The excitement continued for four 

 years. Thirteen thousand florins were paid for a single 

 bulb of Semper Augustus. Governmental interference 

 was necessary in order to end the ruinous speculation. 

 After the craze subsided, the production of varieties 

 continued upon a normal basis, and has persisted 



2593. A sixteenth -century Tulip. 



From the work of Clusius published in 1576. One of the 

 oldest pictures of Tulips. Same size as original plate. 



throughout the centuries in Holland, making that 

 country the center of the bulb-growing industry of the 

 world down to the present day. 



The introduction of the Tulip into England is credited 

 to Clusius, aboxit the year 1577. Tulips reigned supreme 

 in English gardens until the beginning of the eighteenth 

 century, when they were neglected by the rich for the 

 many new plants from America. For a while the Tulip 

 was considered more or less of a poor man's flower, 

 though it has at no time been without many staunch 

 admirers among the upper classes. 



With the Turks the nar- 

 row acuminate flower-seg- 

 ments were in favor, while 

 western taste preferred the 

 rounded forms (Fig. 

 2595). The Turks seem to 

 have been satisfied with a 

 preponderance of the reds 

 and yellows, for in the 

 first sowings of Turkish 

 seeds the majority of the 

 resulting blooms were of 

 those colors. It thus came 

 about that flowers so col- 

 ored were considered com- 

 mon and undesirable in 

 the European gardens and 

 all effort was directed to 

 the production of the 

 rarer white- grounded va- 

 rieties with finely and dis- 

 tinctly marked stripes, 

 those with a sharp bright 

 red being the favorites. 

 Indisputable evidence of 

 this is seen in the old 

 Holland "still-life" paint- 

 ings of that time, where 

 one finds none but the 

 rarer forms represented 

 (Solms-Laubach). All the 

 early Tulips of direct 

 Turkish origin had acute 

 more or less narrow and 

 reflexed segments. In- 

 deed, among all the old 

 engravings, including 

 those of Pena and Lobel, 

 1570, Clusius, 1576, Do- 

 doens, 1578, and Besler, 

 1613, no round -petaled 

 forms are found. Besler's 

 work, "Hortus Eystetten- 

 sis," contains magnificent 

 copper plates, the first in 

 any book on plants. In 

 some copies the plates are 

 beautifully colored by 

 hand. The 53 figures of 

 Tulips in this grand work 

 show how widely diversi- 

 fied was this flower even 

 at that early date. In this 

 and in Parkinson's "Para- 

 disus Terrestris," 1629, 

 many are figured with in- 

 ner segments rounded and 

 outer acute, but none vice 

 versa (so far as could be 

 seen), though that form is mentioned in the descrip- 

 tions. The broad, rounded, erect-petaled forms were 

 developed later, apparently first by the Dutch growers 

 previous to and during the tulipomania, and produced 

 wholly by selection. This ideal has prevailed down to 

 the present time, for the narrow-petaled varieties are 

 practically unknown among our common garden forms; 

 so much so that the extreme typical one has been re- 

 ferred to a separate species (T. acuminata, Fig. 2602). 

 In the Dutch fields they are now known as "thieves, 

 and are destroyed as soon as they make their appearance. 

 Parrot Tulips became known towards the end of the 

 seventeenth century. They were oftentimes considered 



