ASTER HIsTORY 9 
BRIEF SKETCH OF THE GENERAL HISTORY 
OF : ASTER" 
In this sketch of the past history of the Asters, my purpose 
is to supply, first, a brief outline of the history of the genus as a 
whole, reserving the history of each individual species for separate 
consideration later together with its description. There was a 
long period before the definite limitation of species, when for per- 
haps 2,000 years Aster was thought of as a single entity. Dur- 
ing that long period it is possible to treat the history of Aster as one. 
I plan also to present for that period a digest of the current be- 
liefs and superstitions regarding Aster, with a summary of the 
related applications of the name, and a glance at other names 
applied to Aster. My plan is to consider serially each writer who 
had something to say about Aster, and to say enough of him to 
make his relations to the development of knowledge of Asters in- 
telligible. The need of such explanations seems the greater be- 
cause there is so little available in English relating to the history 
of botany before Brunfels. This part of the work becomes 
therefore a sketch of the history of Pre-Clusian botany in its re- 
lations to Aster. 
I call it botany, not in the sense of botany as a science, but for 
lack of any other term to indicate plant-knowledge, however un- 
critical and however often merging into folklore. I call it Pre- 
Clusian, because Clusius’ * descriptions of the plants of Spain in 
1576 ushered in a new era in the definite limitation of species in 
Aster. The principal work available in English on the history of 
botany, Garnsey’s translation of Sachs’ History, begins substanti- 
ally with Caesalpino, in 1583, and properly so, for that work is in- 
tended as a history of dominating botanical ideas. Caesalpino’s 
greatness was not as a describer of Asters, but as a thinker, and 
as enunciator of the principles regnant in botany until Linnaeus. 
For accurate description of new Asters, however, as well as for 
* Clusius, Charles de 1’ Escluse, 1526-1609, who explored parts of France, Spain, 
Portugal, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Hungary and the Netherlands for new 
and rare plants, 1550-1587. 
