CCXVI.— THE PRIVET. 
Ligu strum vulgare Linne. 
T HE genus Ligustrum, like several other members of the Family Oleacea 1 , is 
mainly distinguished by the character of its fruit. It comprises some thirty-five 
species, most of which are Asiatic. Many forms from China, Japan, and northern 
India are now in cultivation. In the latter region they attain the dimensions of 
trees ; but most of the species are, like our British form, merely large shrubs from 
six to ten feet high. Ligustrum vulgare Linn£, our Common Privet, is the only 
European species and its area of distribution extends into northern Africa. 
They have opposite, entire, ovate leaves, which vary in duration, being often 
nearly or completely evergreen. Their young branches terminate in much-branched 
paniculate cymes, which are often described as “ thyrsoid,” from the resemblance of 
their pyramidal outline to the thyrsus, or garlanded pole, in the Classical repre- 
sentations of Dionysos or Bacchus. The individual flowers are generally small and 
white, homogamous, but with a copious supply of honey and a powerful perfume. 
The short, tubular, four-lobed calyx is deciduous : the four-lobed corolla is funnel- 
shaped : there are two included stamens ; and the two united carpels, each with 
two ovules, form a superior two-chambered and two-seeded berry. 
The name Ligustrum , used by Virgil and by Pliny, is most probably connected 
with ligare , to bind, the fairly long and flexible shoots having been used, like osiers, 
not only in basket-making, but also for tying up faggots. There seems to have 
been much dispute as to whether the European species was known to the Greek 
herbarists and, if so, under what name ; while the early English vocabularists seem 
to have got into great confusion as to its identity, especially owing to its having 
been known as Primrose. Thus in iElfric’s tenth-century Vocabulary, printed by 
Professor Earle, we have “ Ligustrum, hunisuge ” : another list, dating from the 
thirteenth century, gives “ Ligustrum, triffoil, hunisuccles ” ; while two fifteenth- 
century lists have it as the name of “primerolle,” “a primerose” and “a cowslowpe.” 
Turner, however, in his “ Libellus de re herbaria novus ” of 1538, which has been 
truly designated “ the first publication in this country of a true Botanical cast,” 
writes to the effect that 
“ Ligustrum is a tree not a herb as the common herd of men of letters believe it to be, and is nothing less than a Prymerose. 
Vergil in the verse, 
‘Alba ligustra cadunt vaccinia nigra leguntur ’ ; 
‘ They fell white privet, black whortleberries are gathered,’ 
spoke not of the branches but of the white flowers of this tree. Ligustrum in Greek is called Cyprus, officinally Ligustrum, 
Alcanna or Henna. Whichever of these names you please may therefore be used as an English name until some fitter name 
occurs to us.” 
Ten years later, in his “ Names of Herbes,” he terms it “ in englishe Prim 
print or priuet ” ; and in the Second Part of his “ Herball,” in 1562, he writes : — 
“ Pryuet groweth very plentuously in Cambrick shyre in the hedges.” 
