BOOK XXI. XXVIII. 52-xxx. 55 



XXVIII. As foliage for chaplets smilax, ivy and 

 their clusters provide the favourite material ; about 

 these I have spoken at length in my chapters on 

 shrubs." There are other kinds also that can be 

 indicated only by their Greek names, because our 

 countrymen for the most part have paid no attention 

 to this nomenclature. Though most of them grow 

 in foreign hmds, yet I must discuss them, because 

 my subject is not Italy but Nature. 



XXIX. So among the leaves used to make chaplets 

 are found those of melotrum, spiraea, wild mar- 

 joram, cneorum, that Hyginus calls cassia, conyza, 

 which he calls cunilago, melissojjhyllum, known to 

 us as apiastrum, and meUlot, wliich we call Cam- 

 panian garland. For in Italy the favourite kind 

 grows in Campania, in Greece at Sunium, next in 

 repute the meUlot of Chalcidice and Crete being 

 found however everywhere only in wild, woody 

 districts. That chaplets were in antiquity often 

 made from the meUlot is shown by the name 

 sertula (garland), which it has adopted as its own. 

 The scent is near to that of saffron, and so is the 

 fiower itself. The Campanian ^' is very popular 

 indeed, having very short and very fleshy leaves. 



XXX. The leaves of trefoil also are used for chap- 

 lets. There are three kinds of it : the first is caUed 

 by some Greeks minyanthes, by others asphaltion, 

 havinjr a larg-er leaf than the other kinds, which the 

 garland makers use. The second kind, oxytri- 

 phyUon, has a pointed leaf. The third is the smaUest 

 of them aU. Among these some have a sinewy stem, 

 such as marathum, hippomarathum, myophonum. 

 They use also fennel-giant, the chisters of the ivy 

 and a red flower classified in another kind of the 



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