Trees, Shrubs, and Plants of Virgil 



the time of the hay harvest, it is tall enough to be 

 topped by the scythe. Moreover, it affects the slopes 

 rather than the level ground. 



Under cultivation and through hybridizing amellus 

 has developed many varieties. In many of them 

 the disk has taken the colour of the rays. 

 Whether it ever does this in the wild state I do 

 not know. 



Virgil recommends boiling the roots in wine as 

 a remedy for bee disease. The taste, as he says, 

 is rough, and the Brescian bee-keepers may have 

 known their business when they gave the root to the 

 sick bees. 



Flower, July to October. 

 Italian names, Amello and Astro. 



Amomum. 



' ferat et rubus asper amomum ' (Ec. iii. 89). 

 ' Assyrium . . . amomum ' (Ec. iv. 25). 



Virgil cannot have known this East Indian shrub, 

 which is akin to the banana and the plantain, 

 though he knew the balsam which it produced. It 

 is cardamom (Amomum cardamomum), and the 

 spice yielded by its seed capsules fetched a high 

 price at Rome. It has been cultivated in our stoves 

 for nearly a hundred years, but its brownish flowers 

 are not very attractive. 



Flower, summer. 



Italian name, Cardamomo. 



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