380 ORIGIN OF CULTIVATED PLANTS. 



Persia,^ the Caucasus ]\Iountains, and Europe, I only 

 find in floras the plant indicated as cultivated, or escaped 

 sometimes from cultivation on rubbish-heaps, waysides, 

 waste ground, etc.^ 



The sum of the historical, philological, and botanical 

 data make me think tliat the species existed before all 

 cultivation, thousands of years ago in China, Japan, and 

 in the Indian Archipelago. Its cultivation must have 

 early spread towards the West, since we know of Sanskrit 

 names, but it does not seem to have been known in Syria, 

 Arabia, and Greece, and it is probably through Russia 

 and Austria that it early arrived among the lake-dwellers 

 of the stone age in Switzerland. 



Common Sorghum Holcus sorghum, Linnreus; An- 

 clropogon sorr/hum, Brotero; Sorghum vidgare, Persoon. 



Botanists are not agreed as to the distinction of 

 several of the species of sorghum, and even as to the 

 genera into which this group of the Graminre should be 

 divided. A good monograph on the sorghums is needed, 

 as in the case of the panicums. In the mean time I will 

 give some information on the principal species, because 

 of their immense importance as food for man, rearing 

 of poultry, and as fodder fur cattle. 



We may take as a typical species the sorghum culti- 

 vated in Europe, as it is figured by Host in his Gramince 

 Austriacce (iv. pi. 2). It is one of the plants most com- 

 monly cultivated by the modern Egyptians, under the 

 name of dourra, and also in equatorial Africa, India, and 

 China.^ It is so productive in hot countries that it is a 

 staple food of immense populations in the old world. 



Linmneus and all authors, even our contemporaries, 

 .say that it is of Indian origin ; but in the first edition of 

 Roxburgh's flora, published in 1820, this botanist, who 

 should have been consulted, asserts that he had only seen 

 it cultivated. He makes the same remark for the allied 

 forms (bicolor, saccharatus, etc.), which are often regarded 



' Buhse, Aufzdhhing, p. 232. 



* See Pai-latore, Fl. ItaL, i. p. 113 ; Mute], Fl. Franc., iV. p. 20, etc. 



* Delilc, Plantes Cult, en ^'jiipte, p. 7 ; Roxburgh, Fl. Ind., edit. 1832, 

 vol. i. p. 269; Aitchison, Catal. oj Punjab FL, p. 175; Bretschnoider, 

 Study and Value, etc., p. 9. 



