Notes

mylasea

Reliqua sunt ferulacei generis, ceu feniculum anguibus, ut diximus, gratissimum, ad condienda plurima cum inaruit utile, eique perquam similis thapsia, de qua diximus inter externos frutices, deinde utilissima funibus cannabis. seritur a favonio; quo densior est eo tenerior. semen eius, cum est maturum, ab aequinoctio autumni destringitur et sole aut vento aut fumo siccatur. ipsa cannabis vellitur post vindemiam ac lucubrationibus decorticata purgatur. optima Alabandica, plagarum praecipue usibus. tria eius ibi genera: inprobatur cortici proximum aut medullae, laudatissima est e medio quae mesa vocatur. secunda Mylasea. quod ad proceritatem quidem attinet, Rosea agri Sabini arborum altitudinem aequat. ferulae duo genera in peregrinis fruticibus diximus. semen eius in Italia cibus est; conditur quippe duratque in urceis vel anni spatio. duo ex ea olera, caules et racemi. corymbian hanc vocant corymbosque quos condunt.

There remain the garden plants of the fennel-giant class, for instance fennel, which snakes are very fond of, as we have said, and which when dried is useful for seasoning a great many dishes, and thapsia, which closely resembles it, of which we have spoken among foreign bushes, and then hemp, which is exceedingly useful for ropes. Hemp is sown when the spring west wind sets in; the closer it grows the thinner its stalks are. Its seed when ripe is stripped off after the autumn equinox and dried in the sun or wind or by the smoke of a fire. The hemp plant itself is plucked after the vintage, and peeling and cleaning it is a task done by candle light. The best is that of Arab-Hissar, which is specially used for making hunting-nets. Three classes of hemp are produced at that place: that nearest to the bark or the pith is considered of inferior value, while that from the middle, the Greek name for which is ‘middles’, is most highly esteemed. The second best hemp comes from Mylasa. As regards height, the hemp of Rosea in the Sabine territory grows as tall as a fruit-tree. The two kinds of fennel-giant have been mentioned above among exotic shrubs. In Italy its seed is an article of diet; in fact it is stored in pots and lasts for as much as a year. Two different parts of it are used as vegetables, the stalks and the branches. This fennel is called in Greek clump-fennel, and the parts that are stored, clumps.

Notes

Genciana

Genciana (text)

Gentiana

Gentiana acaulis L.
Gentiana V Gentianella major verna

Smyrnium olusatrum

Smyrnium olusatrum

Smyrnium olusatrum L.
Riserva naturale Monte Pellegrino Palermo, Sicily

smyrnium, olus atrum

Sed praecipue olusatrum mirae naturae est; hipposelinum Graeci vocant, alii zmyrnium. e lacrima caulis sui nascitur, seritur et radice. sucum eius qui colligunt murrae saporem habere dicunt, auctorque est Theophrastus murra sata natum.

A herb of exceptionally remarkable nature is black-herb [Our alexanders], the Greek name for which is horse parsley, and which others call zmyrnium. It is reproduced from the gum that trickles from its own stalk, but it can also be grown from a root. The people who collect its juice say that it tastes like myrrh, and Theophrastus [Hist. Plant. IX] states that it sprang first from sown myrrh seed.

olus atrum

Olusatrum, quod hipposelinum vocant, adversatur scorpionibus. poto semine torminibus et interaneis medetur, idem difficultatibus urinae semen eius decoctum ex mulso potum. radix eius in vino decocta calculos pellit et lumborum ac lateris dolores. canis rabiosi morsibus potum et inlitum medetur. sucus eius algentes calefacit potus. quartum genus ex eodem aliqui faciunt oreoselinum, palmum alto frutice recto, semine cumino simili, urinae et menstruis efficax.

Olusatrum (alexanders), also called hipposelinum (horse parsley), is antipathetic to scorpions. Its seed taken in drink cures colic and intestinal worms. The seed too, boiled and drunk in honey wine, cures dysuria. Its root, boiled in wine, expels stone, besides curing lumbago and pains in the side. Taken in drink and applied as liniment it cures the bite of a mad dog. A draught of its juices warms those who have been chilled. A fourth kind of parsley is made by some authorities out of oreoselinum (mountain parsley), a straight shrub a palm high, with a seed like cummin, beneficial to the urine and the menses.

smyrnium, olus atrum

Smyrnion caulem habet apii, folia latiora et maxime circa stolones multos quorum a sinu exiliunt, pinguia et ad terram infracta, odore medicato cum quadam acrimonia iucundo, colore in luteum languescente capitibus caulium orbiculatis ut apii, semine rotundo nigroque; arescit incipiente aestate. radix quoque odorata gustu acri mordet, sucosa, mollis. cortex eius foris niger, intus pallidus. odor murrae habet qualitatem, unde et nomen. nascitur et in saxosis collibus et in terrenis. usus eius calfacere, extenuare. urinam et menses cient folia et radix et semen, alvum sistit radix, collectiones et suppurationes non veteres item duritias discutit inlita. prodest et contra phalangia ac serpentes admixto cachry aut polio aut melissophyllo in vino pota, sed particulatim, quoniam universitate vomitionem movet: qua de causa aliquando cum ruta datur. medetur tussi et orthopnoeae semen vel radix, item thoracis aut lienis aut renium aut vesicae vitiis, radix autem ruptis, convolsis. partus quoque adiuvat et secundas pellit. datur et ischiadicis cum crethmo in vino. sudores ciet et ructus, ideo inflationem stomachi discutit, vulnera ad cicatricem perducit. exprimitur et sucus radici utilis feminis et thoracis praecordiorumque desideriis, calfacit enim et concoquit et purgat. semen peculiariter hydropicis datur potu, quibus et sucus inlinitur. et ad malagmata cortice arido et ad obsonia utuntur cum mulso et oleo et garo, maxime in elixis carnibus. sinon concoctiones facit sapore simillima piperi. eadem in dolore stomachi efficax.

Smyrnion has a stem like that of celery [Perhaps “parsley”], and rather broad leaves, which grow mostly about its many shoots, from the curve of which they spring; they are juicy,e bending towards the ground, and with a drug-like smell not unpleasing with a sort of sharpness. The colour shades off to yellow; the heads of the stems are umbellate, as are those of celery; the seed is round and black. It withers at the beginning of summer. The root too has a smell, and a sharp, biting taste, being soft and full of juice. Its skin is dark oh the outside, but the inside is pale. The smell has the character of myrrh, whence too the plant gets its name. It grows on rocky hills, and also on those with plenty of earth. It is used for warming and for reducing. Leaves, root, and seed are diuretic and emmenagogues. The root binds the bowels, and an application of it disperses gatherings and suppurations, if not chronic, as well as indurations; mixed with cachry, polium, or melissophyllum, it is also taken in wine to counteract the poison of spiders and serpents, but only a little at a time, for if taken all at once it acts as an emetic, and so is sometimes given with rue. Seed or root is a remedy for cough and orthopnoea, also for affections of thorax, spleen, kidneys or bladder, and the root is for ruptures and sprains; it also facilitates delivery and brings away the after-birth. In wine with crethmos it is also given for sciatica. It promotes sweating and belching, and therefore dispels flatulence of the stomach. It causes wounds to cicatrize. There is also extracted from the root a juice useful for female ailments, and for affections of the thorax and of the hypochondria, for it is warming, digestive and cleansing. The seed is given in drink, especially for dropsy, for which the juice also is used as liniment. The dried skin is used in plasters, and also as a side-dish with honey wine, oil and garum, especially when the meat is boiled. Sinon tastes very like pepper and aids digestion. It also is very good for pain in the stomach.

olusatrum

Elaphoboscon ferulaceum est, geniculatum digiti crassitudine, semine corymbis dependentibus silis effigie, set non amaris, foliis olusatri.

Elaphoboscon (wild parsnip) is a plant like fennel-giant, with a jointed stem of the thickness of a finger, the seed in clusters hanging down like hartwort, but not bitter, and with the leaves of olusatrum [Alexanders].

Smyrnium

Pliny xvii c. 10 (103?)

Olus atrum

Pliny xix, 8

concave

Creuse. La tige du chanvre est en effet fistuleuse.

smyrnium, olus atrum

Ne faut-il point réunir ces deux mots en un seul, Smyrnium ousatrum ? Le maceron, Smyrnium olusatrum L., est une ombellifère, jadis utilisée en matière médicale. Il se peut cependant que Rabelais ait distingué deux espèces, car on trouve en France deux autres espèces de Smyrnium. L’olusatrum de Pline, ou hipposelinon ou smyrnion est le 3 L. Cf. Pline, XIX, 48; XX, 46; XXVII, 109. (Paul Delaunay)

febves

Fève, Faba vulgaris Mœnch., Papilionacée. (Paul Delaunay)

smyrnium, olus atrum

Plusieurs éditeurs ont proposé de réunir en un seul mot Smyrnium olusatrum; il s’agirait du mauron, variété d’ombellifère utilisée autrefois comme remède.

olus atrum

Le maceron, ombellifère utilisée en pharmacie.

gentiane

gentian. Forms: jencian, gencyan , gencian, gentiane, gentian. [adaptation of Latin gentiana, so called (according to Pliny) after Gentius, king of Illyria.]

Any plant belonging to the genus Gentiana (compare felwort); esp. G. lutea, the officinal gentian which yields the gentian-root of the pharmacopoeia.

attributive, as in gentian-blue, -flower, -root, -tree, -violet, -water, -wine; gentian-bitter, the tonic principle extracted from gentian root; gentian-worts, Lindley’s name for the N.O. Gentianaceæ.

Smyrna

Smyrna. [A place-name; Latin Smyrna, Greek Smurna.]

The chief port of Asia Minor, situated at the head of the gulf of the same name, used attributive in the names of various things produced in the vicinity of or connected with the city, as Smyrna carpet, cotton, earth, fig, kingfisher, opium, rug, runt, wheat.

Smyrnium olusatrum

Smyrnium olusatrum L., common name Alexanders is a cultivated flowering plant, belonging to the family Apiaceae (or Umbelliferae). It is also known as alisanders, horse parsley and smyrnium. It was known to Theophrastus (9.1) and Pliny the Elder (N.H. 19.48).
In the correct conditions, Alexanders will grow 120 to 150 cm tall, with a solid stem that becomes hollow with age. The leaves are bluntly toothed, the segments ternately divided the segments flat, not fleshy.
Alexanders is native to the Mediterranean but is able to thrive farther north. The flowers are yellow-green in colour, and its fruits are black. Alexanders is intermediate in flavor between celery and parsley. It was once used in many dishes, either blanched or not, but it has now been replaced by celery. It was also used as a medicinal herb. It is now almost forgotten as a food source, although it still grows wild in many parts of Europe, including Britain. It is common among the sites of medieval monastery gardens.

Notes

blanchissant

Blanchir. To blanch, white, whiten, make white.

Salvia

Ferula

Ferula (text)

plantes férulacees

Again there are differences in the ‘core’: in the first place according as plants have any or have none, as some say is the case with elder among other things; and in the second place there are differences between those which have it, since in different plants it is respectively fleshy, woody, or membranous; fleshy, as in vine fig apple pomegranate elder ferula; woody, as in Aleppo pine silver-fir fir; in the last-named especially so, because it is resinous. Harder again and closer than these is the core of dog-wood kermes-oak oak laburnum mulberry ebony nettle-tree.

The cores in themselves also differ in colour; for that of ebony and oak is black, and in fact in the oak it is called ‘oak-black’; and in all these the core is harder and more brittle than the ordinary wood; and for this reason the core of these trees can not be bent. Again the core differs in closeness of texture. A membranous core is not common in trees, if indeed it is found at all; but it is found in shrubby plants and woody plants generally, as in reed ferula and the like. Again in some the core is large and conspicuous, as in kermes-oak oak and the other trees mentioned above; while in others it is less conspicuous, as in olive and box. For in these trees one cannot find it isolated, but, as some say, it is not found in the middle of the stem, being diffused throughout, so that it has no separate place; and for this reason some trees might be thought to have no core at all; in fact in the date-palm the wood is alike throughout.

ferula-like plant

With spineless plants it is not possible to make such ‘generic’ distinctions; for the variation of the leaves in size and shape is endless, and the differences are not clearly marked; but we must try to distinguish on another principle. There are many classes of such plants and they differ widely, as rock-rose bryony madder privet kneoron marjoram savory sphakos (sage) elelisphakos (salvia) horehound konyza balm, and others like these; and in addition to these we have the plants with a ferulalike stem or with a stem composed of fibre, as fennel horse-fennel narthekia (ferula) narthex (ferula) and the plant called by some wolf’s bane, and others like these. All these, as well as any other ferula-like plants, may be placed in the class of under-shrubs.

The class of ferula-like plants (for this too belongs to the under-shrubs) comprises many kinds: here we must first speak of the characteristic which is common to all, including ferula itself4 (narthex) and narthekia, whether they both belong to the same kind and differ only in size, or whether, as some say, they are distinct. The obvious character of both is alike, except as to size; for narthex grows very tall, while narthekia is a small plant. Each of them has a single stalk, which is jointed; from this spring the leaves and some small stalks; the leaves come alternately—by which I mean that they do not spring from the same part of the joint, but in alternating rows. For a considerable distance they embrace the stalk, like the leaves of the reed, but they turn back from it more owing to their softness and their size; for the leaf is large soft and much divided, so that it is almost hair-like; the largest leaves are the lowest ones next the ground, and so on in proportion. The flower is quince-yellow and inconspicuous, the fruit6 like dill, but larger. The plant divides at the top and has some small branches, on which grow the flower and the fruit. It also bears flowers and fruit on the side-stalks all the way up, like dill. The stalk only lasts a year, and the growth takes place in spring, the leaves growing first and then the stem, as with other plants. It roots deep and has but a single root. Such is the ferula.

Of the others some to a certain extent resemble ferula, that is, in having a hollow stem; for instance deadly nightshade hemlock hellebore asphodel: while some have a stem more or less, as it were, consisting of fibre, as fennel aconite and others like these. The fruit of deadly nightshade is peculiar in being black and like a grape and like wine in taste.

ferule

Et ferulam inter externas dixisse conveniat arborumque generi adscripsisse, quoniam quarundam naturae, sicuti distinguemus, lignum omne corticis loco habent forinsecus, ligni autem loco fungosam intus medullam ut sabuci, quaedam vero inanitatem ut harundines. calidis nascitur locis atque trans maria, geniculatis nodata scapis. duo eius genera: nartheca Graeci vocant adsurgentem in altitudinem, nartheciam vero semper humilem. a genibus exeunt folia maxima ut quaeque terrae proxima; cetera natura eadem quae aneto, et fructu simili. nulli fruticum levitas maior; ob id gestatu facilis baculorum usum senectuti praebet.

It may be suitable to have fennel giant [Ferula communis] mentioned among the exotics and assigned to the genus ‘tree,’ inasmuch as the structure of some plants, in the classification that we shall adopt, has the whole of the wood outside in place of bark and inside, in place of wood, a fungous pith like that of the elder, though some have an empty hollow inside like reeds. This fennel grows in hot countries over sea; its stalk is divided by knotted joints. It has two varieties, one called in Greek narthex, which rises to some height, the other narthecia, which always grows low. From the joints shoot out very large leaves, the larger the nearer to the ground; but in other respects it has the same nature as the dill, and the fruit is similar. No shrub supplies a wood of lighter weight, and consequently it is easy to carry, and supplies walking-sticks to be used by old gentlemen.

ferula

Est et haec natura ut alii alibi pisces principatum optineant, coracinus in Aegypto, zaeus, idem faber appellatus, Gadibus, circa Ebusum salpa. obscenus alibi et qui nusquam percoqui possit nisi ferula verberatus; in Aquitania salmo fluviatilis marinis omnibus praefertur.

It is also a fact of nature that different fishes hold the first rank in different places … the saupe in the neighbourhood of Iviza, though elsewhere it is a disgusting fish, and everywhere it is unable to be cooked thoroughly unless it has been beaten with a rod…

ferulacée

Ferulacé: Round, also, of the kind of the herbe Ferula.
Ferule: A Ferula, or Paulmer used in Schooles for correction; also, the herbe Ferula, Sagapene, Fennell Giant; also, a reed, or cane.

ferule

FÉRULE. T. de Botan. Genre de plantes ombellifères qui croissent principalement dans les régions méridionales, et dont une espèce, originaire de Perse, fournit l’Assa foetida, employée souvent comme antispasmodique. Chez les anciens Romains, les maîtres d’école se servaient d’une tige de férule pour châtier leurs écoliers.

Il se dit, dans le langage ordinaire, d’Une petite palette de bois ou de cuir dont on se servait autrefois pour frapper dans la main des écoliers, lorsqu’ils avaient fait quelque faute. Un maître d’école qui a toujours la férule à la main.

ferulacée

Sembable à la tige fistuleuse de la férule qui est, d’aprés Fée, Ferula communis, L. (Ombellifére). Le caractère de la férule, dit Pline, est d’être divisée en tiges partagées par des nœuds: geniculatis nodata scapis (H.N., XIII, 42). Cette tige est grosse, fongueuse, crusée d’une canal médullaire, [medulla] carnosa… ferulæ, dit Théophraste, l. I, ch. 9, assez solide pour servir de bâton, et néanmoins assez lègère , pour ne pas blesser ceux qu’elle frappe. Pline, H.N. XIX, 56, range le chanvre, avec la thapsie et le fenouil, parmi les plantes férulacées. (Paul Delaunay)

Notes

profonder

To sound, search, pierce, or goe deep into; to dive, or sink unto the bottom of; to press downe, or put into the deepe.

coubtée

Coubte. The elbow

strike deep

Read ne profonde, from profonder, the verb (profundare, Du Cange), a far better reading than ne est profonde (M.)

Notes

François Rabelais

François Rabelais
Anonymous, 17th century
Musée national du château et des Trianons, Palace of Versailles

Laid aboard

Detail of woodcut by Holbein. Death touchers a man loading a ship.

The Tempest, Act 4, Scene 1

Line 123:
Earth’s increase, foison plenty,
Barns and garners never empty,
Vines with clust’ring bunches growing,
Plants with goodly burden bowing;
Spring come to you at the farthest
In the very end of harvest.

Line 175:
All things in common nature should produce
Without sweat or endeavor; treason, felony,
Sword, pike, knife, gun, or need of any engine
Would I not have; but nature should bring forth
Of its own kind all foison, all abundance,
To feed my innocent people.

Earth’s increase, foison plenty,
Barns and garners never empty,

Foison

Foison: Store, plentie, abundance, great fullness, enough.

je veids

Le narrateur signale sa présence, au moment de louer cette plante qui réunit les vertus du chanvre et du lin. Pline n’est pas le seul à la vanter. Cœlius Rhodiginus, Antiquae Lectiones, V, 12, célèbre le lin «diuinæ rei maxime idoneum»; voir aussi Polydore Vergile, De rerum inuentoribus, III, 6.

robbes

Au sens général de vêtements; les hommes portaient d’ailleurs des robes.