0285 



EUONYMUS 



Family: BUCKTHORN FAMILY. [Translator's note: now classified in the family 

 Celastraceae] . 



Reproductive system: PENTANDRY, MONOGYNY. 



The European euonymus, Evonymus Eur opens, Linn., [Translator's note: now 

 designated Euonymus europaeus, (the spindle tree)] is a large shrub with a stem that 

 grows three or four meters high. The bark on its branches is smooth and greenish. The 

 wood is pale yellow and fragile. The leaves are oval-lanceolate, pointed, with dentate 

 margins and are on short petioles. The flowers are whitish and small. Three or four of 

 them are held on quite a long common peduncle. The calyx has four or five divisions 

 with a fleshy disk inside it. The corolla has five, but more often four petals, four or five 

 stamens, and a thread-like style. The fruit is a capsule with four or five compartments, 

 each one containing one or two seeds covered with a pulpy red-colored aril. In one 

 variety it's white. 



FLOWERS: in May. 



RANGE: France and Europe, in woodlands. 



NOMENCLATURE. The common names are priest's cap, wood for larding pins; in 

 the south, beggarly priest 's cap. German, der spindelbaum, spulbaum. Dutch, 

 paapenhout, luizenboom. English, the spindle tree, prickle-wood. Danish, beenved. 

 Italian, fusagine. Spanish, bonetero. Russian, mereskletiana, kislianka. Bohemian, 

 bieslen. Tartar, ukurgol. Kalmuk, emegoldan. 



USES. This shrub is suitable for decorating autumn groves. Its abundant and 

 beautiful red-orange colored fruit makes an outstanding impression. The wood is hard; 

 it's used for making pegs, larding-pins for butchers, vessels, distaffs, and spindles. 

 Euonymus sticks burned in an iron tube form charcoal pencils that draftsmen use to 

 sketch initial outlines 



