BOOK XXI. Liii. 90-Liv. 91 



LIII. The Egyptians have besides many plants of 

 no repute, but they hold in the highest esteem 

 one called cnecos ; it is unknown in Italy and the 

 Egyptians value it, not as a food, but for its oil, 

 which they extract from the seed. The chief 

 varieties are the wild and the cultivated. Of the 

 wild there are two species. One is similar to the 

 cultivated, but has a stilf'* stem. This is why the 

 women of old used the stem of this species ^ as a 

 distaif, for which reason it is called by some atractyUs. 

 Its seed is white, large and bitter. The other is 

 rather prickly, with a more fleshy stem, which pricHy 

 almost trails on the ground, the seed being very /''"""• 

 small. This belongs to the class of spinous plants, 

 for I must classify also the various kinds of them. 



LIV. Some plants then are prickly," while others 

 are without prickles. Of prickly plants the species 

 are many. Of nothing but prickle are asparagus 

 and scorpio, for they have no leaves at all. Some 

 prickly plants, however, have leaves, for instance 

 thistle, erynge, glycyrrhiza "* and nettle. For all 

 these have a sharp sting in their leaves. Some have 

 foHage also along * the prickly spine, as caltrop and 

 rest-harrow. Some again have prickles not on the 

 leaves but on the stem, as pheos, that some have 



" Hort translates dKavOiKos, aKavOai, in the closely parallel 

 passage of Theophrastus (VI. 1, 2) by " spinous," " spines." 

 It is scarcely possible to use these words in translating Pliny, 

 for he includes the nettle. 



^ " Sweet root," our liquorice. But there is an error here. 

 See XXII. 24, and index of plants in Vol. VII. 



* Theophrastus has (VI. I, 3) ra Se koI Trapa Trrjv aKavOav 

 €T(pov ex^t (fivXXov: " Others again have leaves as welJ as 

 their spines " (Hort). Apparently Pliny took TTapa to be 

 " along." 



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