— 78 - 



Outside of Java the species has not yet been found. 



In the icones ineditae of Kuhl et v. Hasselt there is a very good 

 coloured drawing of this plant. Before I saw living specimens I had taken 

 this for a badly coloured drawing of C. petiolata. 



Incompletely knownspecies. 



Curcuma longa. Linn. sp. pi. 2 (1753); Rev. Lugd. Bat (1740) p. 12; 

 Hort, zeyl. 77 (1747); Mat. med. M 49 ; — Curcuma radice longo, Hermann 

 Hort. Ac. Lugd. Bat. (1687) P. 239. Cum tab. 



Tab. nostra 1. 



The name is based only on Hermann, who gives the following des- 

 cription: "Curcuma radice longa (Terra mérita officinarum, radice crocea.)" 

 The plant consists of a tuberculate terete rhizome, which is a finger thick 

 and grows horizontally, consisting of many shoots and rings, gives birth 

 from its buds to some thick fibers, massive, externally pale and rough, 

 internally orange and gradually tending towards miniate, quasi formed of 

 condensed orange coloured sap, of a bitter oderiferous sharp taste, of an 

 aromatic scent. Light-green flat leaves, a span long and one or two palms 

 wide arise from its buds terminating in a tolerably long point." 



"From the young and valid tubers of this rhizome a scape is produced, 

 which is three-fourth feet long, terete, juicy, as thick as a quill, pale-green, 

 naked in its lower part, dilated from the middle to the top to a thick 

 round spike consisting of leaflets which are at first pale-green, than yellow- 

 reddish or pale-yellow, wide 2 nails, ending in a curved top, imbricate, 

 containing in their hollow a tenacious and viscous fluid gathered from the 

 dew of night. Moreover flowers arise successively from each scale, resem- 

 bling somewhat Canna-flowers but three times smaller, composed of 4 mostly 

 pale-yellow or purple-red leaflets, a hindmost one which is erect, two 

 lateral ones outstanding and a middle one which is larger and ciliate." Etc. 



In this description the rhizome agrees with the "Curcuma domestica 

 major'' of Ramph. by the deep-yellow clarly miniate color of the rhizome. 

 The further description as well as the figure, however, indicates unques- 

 tionably a species with a lateral inflorscence, this is not a mistake, for 

 on page 639 the author reverts again to this fact. The description should 

 have been taken from a plant cultivated in the Hortus of Leyde. The 

 separate flower on the engraving seems to have been copied from the 

 figure of Rheede (Hort. mal. XI t. 11), published some years afterwards 

 (see Dryander Trans. Linn. Soc. II, 1792, 212) and which represents Gas^ro- 

 chilus panduratam Ridl ; it resembles somewhat a dried flower of Ci/rc«ma. 

 That Hermann calls the flower "mostly yellow but sometimes purple-red", 

 proves that the description is not taken from one single specimen (the 

 purple-colour might suggest a flower of G. panduratum) and because Hermann 



