296 ORIGIN OF CULTIVATED PLANTS. 



basin, but it grows nearly wild on the south-west coast 

 of France, where the winter is very mild.^ 



We turn to historical and philological records to see 

 whether the area was more limited in antiquity. The 

 ancient Egyptians called the fig teh,^ and the earliest 

 Hebrew books speak of the fig, whether wild or culti- 

 vated, under the name teenah,^ which leaves its trace in 

 the Arabic fin.* The Persian name is quite different, 

 unjir; but I do not know if it dates from the Zend. 

 Piddington's Index has a Sanskrit name, udumvara, 

 which Roxburgh, who is very careful in such matters, 

 does not give, and which has left no trace in modern 

 Indian languages, to judge from four names quoted by 

 authors. The antiquity of its existence east of Persia 

 appears to me doubtful, until the Sanskrit name is 

 verified. The Chinese received the fio; tree from Persia, 

 but only m the eighth century of our era.^ Herodotus*^ 

 says the Persians did not lack figs, and Reynier, who has 

 made careful researches into the customs of this ancient 

 people, does not mention the fig tree. This only proves 

 that the species was not utilized and cultivated, but it 

 perhaps existed in a wild state. 



The Greeks called the wild fig erineos, and the Latins 

 caprificus. Homer mentions a fig tree in the Iliad which 

 grew near Troy.'^ Helm asserts*^ that the cultivated fig 

 cannot have been developed from the wild fig, but all 



* Connt Solms Laubach, in a learned discussion (Rerhinft, Domestica- 

 tion, etc., des Feigenhaums, in 4to, 1882), has himself observed facts of this 

 nature aheady indicated by various authors. He did not find the seed 

 provided with embryos (p. 64), which he attributes to the absence of the 

 insect (Blastophaga), which generally lives in the wild fig, and facilitates 

 the fertilization of one flower by another in the interior of the fruit.- It 

 is asserted, however, that fertilization occasionally takes place without 

 the intervention of the insect. 



* Chabas, Melanges EgyptoL, 3rd series (1873), vol. ii. p. 92. 



Kosenmuller, Bihl. Alterth., i. p. 285 ; Keynier, con. PuU. des 

 Arahes et des Juifs, p. 470. 



* Forskal, Fl. /Egypto-Aral., p. 125. Lagarde {Revue Critique d'His- 

 toire, Feb. 27, 1882) says that this Semitic name is very ancient. 



* Bretschneider, in Solms, i(bt supra, p. 51. ^ Herodotus, i. 71. 



* Lenz, Botanik der Griechen, p. 421, qui.tes four lines of Homer, 

 See also Hehn, Culturpflanzen, edit. 3, p. 84. 



* Hehn, Ctilturpjlavzen, edit. 3, p. 513. 



