Trees, Shrubs, and Plants of Virgil 



give to the noxious wildings a mastery over the 

 flowers worthy of a garden. Few plants are more 

 masterful in occupying land than what is known as 

 Christ's thorn (Paliurus aculeatus). The plant is 

 common in Palestine, and disputes with Zizyphus 

 Spina Christi the claim to have supplied the crown 

 of thorns at the Cruciiixion. Its so-called thorns 

 are in fact stipular prickles. In the decay of Etruria 

 the plant went ahead to such an extent that in war- 

 fare it could play the part now assigned to barbed 

 wire, for it is probably the shrub through whose 

 thickets Polybius tells us the Gauls could not pass 

 to attack the Romans until they had stripped off 

 their clothes (ii. 28). Dennis, who refers to this 

 passage, was himself kept away by the shrub from 

 the walls of Rusellae, but had not the curiosity to 

 learn its botanical name. ' The area of the city and 

 the slopes around it are densely covered with a 

 thorny shrub called " marruca," which I had often 

 admired elsewhere for its bright yellow blossoms and 

 delicate foliage ; but as an antagonist it is most for- 

 midable, particularly in winter, when its fierceness is 

 unmitigated by a leafy covering. Even could one 

 disregard the thorns, the difficulty of forcing one's 

 way through the thickets is so great that some of the 

 finest portions of the walls are unapproachable from 

 below.' It will be seen that Columella had reason 

 in recommending the shrub for hedges. 



The natural order to which ' marruca ' belongs 

 is represented in England by the two buckthorns, one 

 of which has formidable spines, and in America is 



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