386 ORIGIN OF CULTIVATED PLANTS. 



arunya} whence come, probably, several names in modern 

 Indian lanoruawes, and oviiza or oruzon of tlie ancient 

 Greeks, rouz or arous of the Arabs. Thcophrastus ^ 

 mentioned rice as cultivated in India. The Greeks 

 became acquainted with it through Alexander's expedi- 

 tion. "According to Aristobulus," says Strabo,^ "rice 

 grows in Bactriana, Babylonia, Susida ; " and he adds, 

 " we may also add in Lower Sj-ria." Further on he notes 

 that the Indians use it for food, and extract a spirit from 

 it. These assertions, doubtful perhaps for Bactriana, 

 show that this cultivation was firmly established, at 

 least, from the time of Alexander (400 B.C.), m the 

 Eujihrates valley, and from the beginning of our era 

 in the hot and irrigated districts of Syria. The Old 

 Testament does not mention rice, but a careful and 

 judicious writer, Reynier,^ has remarked several passages 

 in the Talmud which relate to its cultis^ation. These 

 facts lead us to suppose that the Indians employed 

 rice after the Chinese, and that it spread still later 

 towards the Euphrates earlier, however, than the Ar3"an 

 invasion into India. A thousand 3'ears elapsed between 

 the existence of this cultivation in Babylonia and its 

 transportation into S3^ria, whence its introduction into 

 , Egypt after an interval of probably two or three centuries. 

 ' There is no trace of rice among the grains or paintings of 

 ' ancient Egypt.^ Strabo, who had visited this country 

 ^' as well as Syria; does not say that rice was cultivated in 

 Egvpt in his time, but that the Garamantes ^ grew it, 

 and this people is believed to have inhabited an oasis to 

 the south of Cartilage. It is possible that they received 

 it from Syria. At all events, Egypt could not long fail 



* riddingtori, Index ; Hehn, Culturpfljnzen, edit. 3, p. -i37. 

 Theophrastus, Hist, lib. iv. cap. 4, 10. 



' Strabo, Giographie, Tardieu's translation, lib. xv. cap. 1, 18; 

 lib. XV. cap. 1, 53. . ^ ^ 



* Kcynier, ^"cononiie des Arabes et des Juifs (1820), p. 450 ; Ecinomie 

 Puhlique et Rurale des Egypt iens et des Cnrthaijivois (1S23). p. 32k 



* linger mentions none ; Birch, in 1878, furnishes a note to Wilkin- 

 son's Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians, ii. p. 402, " Tliere 

 is no proof of the cultivation of rice, of which no grains have been found. ' 



' Rejnier, ibid. 



