208 ORIGIN OF CULTIVATED PLANTS. 



Pontus, though they received or brought back several 

 specimens of P. avium} 



In the north of India, P. cerasiis exists only as a 

 cultivated plant.^ The Chinese do not appear to have 

 been acquainted with our two kinds of cherry. Hence 

 it may be assumed that it was not ver}^ early introduced 

 into India, and the absence of a Sanskrit name confirms 

 this. We have seen that, according to Grisebach, P. 

 cerasus is nearly wild in Macedonia. It was said to 

 be wild in the Crimea, but Steven ^ only saw it cultivated; 

 and Rehmann * gives only the allied species, P. chaTiioi- 

 cerasus, Jacquin, as wild in the south of Russia. I very 

 much doubt its wild character in any locality north of 

 the Caucasus. Even in Greece, where Fi-aas said he saw 

 this tree wild, Heldreich only knows it as a cultivated 

 species.^ In Dalmatia,^ a particular variety or allied 

 species, P. Marasca, is found really wild; it is used 

 in making Maraschino wine. P. cerasus is wild in 

 mountainous parts of Italy '^ and in tlie centre of France,^ 

 but farther to the west and north, and in Spain, the 

 species is only found cultivated, and naturalized here 

 and there as a bush. P. cerasus, more than the bird- 

 cherry, evidently presents itself in Europe, as a foreign 

 tree not completely naturalized. 



None of the often-quoted passages ^ in Theophrastus, 

 Pliny, and other ancient authors appear to apply to 

 P. cerasus}^ The most important, that of Theophrastus, 

 belongs to Prunus avium, because of the height of 

 the tree, a character which distinguishes it from P. 

 cerasus, Kerasos being the name for the bird-cherry 



* Boissier, Fl. Orient., iL p. 619; TcUhatchefif, Asie Mineure, Bot, p. 

 198. 



2 Sir J. Hooker, Fl. of Brit. India, ii. p. 313. 



^ Steven, Verzeichniss Halhinselm, etc., p. 147. 



■* Eehmann, Verhandl. Nat. Ver. Brunn, x. 1871. 



^ Heldreich, Isutzpji. Griech., p. 69 j PfMnzen d'Attisch. Ehene., p. 477. 



" Viviani, Fl. Dalmat., iii. p. 258. ' Bertoloni, Fl. Ital., v. p. 131. 



^ Lecoc and Lamotte, Catal. du Plat. Centr. de la France, p. 148. 



^ Theophrastes, Hist. PL, lib. 3, c. 13 ; Pliny, lib. 15, c. 25, and others 

 quoted in Lenz, Bot. der Alien Gr. and Eom., p. 710, 



*" Part of the description of Theophrastus shows a confusion with 

 other trees. He says, for instance, that the nut is scft. 



