DiGEst oF ANCIENT DESCRIPTION 25 
DIGEST OF ANCIENT DESCRIPTION AND BELIEF 
RELATING TO ASTER 
The purpose of this digest is to bring into one comparative 
view what was written regarding Aster during its earlier or mono- 
typic history, free from attendant matter relative to writers and 
their works—which will be considered in due succession afterward. 
The present digest will afford interesting examples of development 
and of the growth of ideas as passed on from one writer to another, 
—forming as it does a section cut through time, and exposing to 
view in its succession of mental attitudes, such alternations as the 
progressive steps of growth of one period to be followed by atrophy | 
in another. 
For the purpose of this digest I use as complete or partial 
equivalents to Aster, i. e., Aster Amellus L., the Dioscoridean syn- 
onyms, those of Caspar Bauhin and other sixteenth century writers, 
and the zodvég@aipoy of Hippocrates, Pausanias’ Asterion, the Ar- 
gemon of Pliny, bk. 26, c. 59, and bk. 24,c. 19; and some others 
for which see the tables of plant names. 
Citations for Aster Amellus L. from authors later than Clusius 
are added for comparison of stem, color, habitat, etc. 
The following abbreviations are used: D. = Diosc., V.=Verg. 
Bavaria—For a young Bavarian girl who was accustomed to 
pick the flower, Aster Amellus L., on the hills near Passau, until 
about 1898 and knew it only by the name Himmelschliissel ; cited 
to exhibit German folk-belief. 
Attica.—For a young Greek, who, 1890 and earlier, knew 
the flower as native near Athens, only as dozpov and as included in 
dozpolodiovboy ; cited like the preceding, to compare ancient folk- 
belief with the present, and to exhibit survival of ancient concep- 
tions. 
Original descriptions of the plant occur in whole or in part in 
Vergil, Dioscorides, Pliny (a few sentences), Valerius Cordus— 
1539, Fuchs 1542, Matthioli 1544, perhaps Dodoens 1554, per- 
haps Lyte in 1578, or in the 1595 edition, in Clusius 1583, 
