Pliny Natural History, Vol. IV (Loeb Latin-English)

Famous plane-trees.

V. Famous plane-trees are: (1) one that grew in the walkways of the Academy at Athens, the roots of which were 50 feet long and spread wider than the branches; (2) at the present day there is a celebrated plane in Lycia, blessed by the presence of a cool spring. It stands by the roadside like a house, with a hollow cavity inside it 81 feet across. It forms a shady grove with its crown and shields itself with vast branches—each as big as a tree—covering the fields with its long shadows. To complete its resemblance to a grotto, it embraces inside its circular rim of rock a supply of mossy pumice-stones. It is a tree so worthy of wonder that Licinius Mucianus, a three-time consul and recently the lieutenant-governor of the province, thought it worth recording for posterity that he had held a banquet inside the tree with eighteen members of his retinue. The tree provided couches of foliage on a grand scale, and he even went to bed inside it, shielded from every breath of wind. He found the agreeable sound of the rain dropping through the foliage more delightful than any gleaming marble, painted decorations, or gilded paneling could have provided. (3) Another instance involves the Emperor Caligula, who, on an estate at Velletri, was impressed by the flooring of a single plane tree and the benches laid loosely on beams made from its branches. He held a banquet in the tree—himself taking up a significant portion of the shade Original: "himself constituting a considerable portion of the shadow" (referring to the lack of the natural property of losing its foliage in winter).—in a dining room large enough to hold fifteen guests and their servants. The emperor called this dining room his "nest." (4) There is a single plane tree at the side of a spring at Gortyn, on the island of Crete, which is celebrated in written records...