LANDMARKS OF BOTANICAL HISTORY GREENE 2gS 



Taxonomy. Cordus' Books I and II are devoted to herbaceous 

 plants, Book III to woody growths great and small. He accepts, 

 then, and without objection, these anciently established first Grand 

 Divisions of the plant world. The primary division of the herbace- 

 ous plants is not made from the point of view of affinities, but is 

 ordered historically rather, as one may say; for while the heading of 

 Book I is "Concerning Divers Herbs," that of Book II reads. 

 "Plants whose History was either inexactly transmitted by the 

 Ancients, or else altogether omitted. " Such headings dp not seem 

 to promise much of taxonomic doQtrine, or of the tacit expression 

 of it by grouping. Members of the same natural family, and 

 species of the same genus will almost inevitably be distributed 

 partly to Book I and partly to Book II. 



Despite these seeming obstacles to ready expression, and while 

 there has never yet been any attempt to relegate all genera to fami- 

 lies, or even formally to characterize any of those several f amiUes that 

 have always been recognized, still Cordus advances well beyond all 

 his predecessors in this significant part of botanical systematizing. 

 When, as sometimes happens, his general plan has led to the placing 

 of some type away from its real cognates, he is apt to give the hint 

 that such genus thus isolated in his book belongs to a certain family. 

 An example of this occurs in connection with his new description 

 of the old genus Lupinus. His first word is "Lupinus is a legu- 

 minous plant. "' He seems to be offering this as a piece of taxono- 

 mic information that is needed. He is not presenting his readers 

 with an empty platitude. When writing of Faba^ and Cicer,^ 

 and Phaseolus* he does not tell that either one is a leguminous 

 plant. All the world knows that these are, and have been so 

 classed immemorially. The family of leguminosae of antiquity 

 consisted of such papilionacese as yielded edible seeds and were 

 therefore food plants. Important though they were, they could 

 not be harvested and threshed after the manner of harvesting the 

 frumenta, or cerealia. The individual pods had to be collected by 

 hand; hence the very name legumina. Lupinus was not one of 

 the leguminous plants with the ancients. Its seeds were bitter, but 

 endowed with active medicinal qualities. It was by virtue of botan- 

 ical principles quite new in Cordus' day that he dared to say Lu- 

 pinus is a leguminous plant. The family was now receiving 



'Hist. PI, p. 137. 

 ' Ibid., p. 166. 

 ' Ibid., p. 99. 

 * Ibid., p. 127'- 



