Cerintha 



and blossom the plant seems no more to deserve 

 it than many others which he names. It has been 

 explained as an allusion to the general distribution 

 of the plant, but this is unsatisfactory. It seems 

 possible that Virgil refers to the little account made 

 of honeywort in the works of the Greek botanists. 

 One is reminded of ' the little northern plant, long 

 overlooked,' which Linnaeus chose to bear his own 

 name. 



Flower, April and May. 



Italian names, Cerinta, Scarlattina, and Erba- 

 tortora. 



CiCUTA. 



' disparibus septem compacta cicutis | fistula" {Ec. ii. 36). 

 'fragili cicuta' (Ec. v. 85). 



Umbelliferous plants are notoriously difficult to 

 identify, and Virgil may have used our word of any 

 plant of that type which Shakespeare and North- 

 amptonshire folk call kexes — any large plant of the 

 order with hollow stems. It seems likely that what 

 was used for executions at Athens was not hemlock 

 but cowbane, to which Linnaeus gave the name of 

 Cicuta virosa. This cannot well be Virgil's plant, 

 for it is rare in Italy, and confined to the lands north 

 of the Apennines. The Latin cicuta was, however, 

 a poisonous plant, and may well have been what we 

 call hemlock (Conium maculatum). If so, Linnaeus 

 has transposed the names, giving to hemlock the 

 Greek name for cowbane and to cowbane the Latin 

 name for hemlock. 



31 



