NOTES ON HEL1ANTHUS TUBEROSUS. 199 



" Jerusalem artichoke " was known to English and Continen- 

 tal botanists. 



I can discover no authority whatever, before 1700, for 

 ascribing to the Hellanthus tuberosus, either a Brazilian or 

 a Mexican origin, except — and the exception is unimportant 

 — in C. Bauhin's identification (in his Pinax, 277) with"He- 

 lianthemum Indicum tuberosum" (H. tuberosus, L.), of a 

 plant that he had described in his earlier "Prodromus" (ed. 

 1671, p. 70) as " Chrysanthemon latlfolium Praslllanum" 

 from a dried specimen sent to him " eo nomine " from the 

 garden of Contarini. 



The first trace I find of this species, in Europe, is in the 

 2d part (cap. 6) of Fabio Colonna's " Ecphrasis minus cogni- 

 tarum stirpium," published at Rome in 1616. He described 

 it from a plant growing in the garden of Cardinal Farnese. 

 The Sunflower was already well known to European botanists, 

 and had been described and figured by Dodoens (1563) and 

 Lobel (1576) as Chrysanthemum Peruvianum and Flos 

 soils Peruvlanus. With reference to these descriptions, 

 probably, Colonna gave the new species the name of Aster 

 Peruanus, tuberosa radice, otherwise Soils jlos Farnesianus. 

 (He gave a more particular description of the plant in his 

 annotations to Recchi's Hernandez, "Plant. Mexic. Hist.," 

 1651, pp. 878, 881, as Peruanus Soils Jlos ex Indils tube- 

 rosws.) 



The author of the " Descriptio variorum plantarum, in 

 Horto Farnesiano," published under the name of Tobias Al- 

 dinus (Rome, 1625), gave some account of the roots, which 

 he calls " Tubera Indica," of the Solis Jlos tuberosus, seu 

 Flos Farnesianus Fabll Columnar (p. 91). It may be ob- 

 served that several of the rarer plants in the Farnese garden, 

 at this time, were from " Canada " and " Virginia." The ' 

 Passion Flower (admirably figured by Aldinus) is described 

 under its Virginian name, "Maracot" (the "Maraeocks" of 

 John Smith and Strachey) ; and a Campanula Americana is 

 otherwise named " Campanula Vlrglniana, seu ex Virglnlis 

 Insulls." 



C. Bauhin, in his " Pinax " (first published in 1623), ed. 



