Enquiry into Plants

Let it be permitted to set forth a few examples in this place: 1. A method for producing grapes without seeds. 2. A method for joining two varieties of the vine (Vitis vinifera L.) through grafting, so that white and black grapes may be found on the same cluster. 3. A method for checking excessive growth by splitting the stem and inserting a stone. 4. A method for correcting the sterility of almond trees with the help of an iron tube driven into the trunk, through which the excess sap may flow out. 5. A method for many fruit-bearing trees by removing or girdling the bark: for that most acute man knew very well, as he indeed often explicitly warned, that fertility arises from weakness, and sterility from vigor.

As for the plan of this work, it was my intention to publish it in the smallest possible bulk, so that it might accompany the botanist in the field and on his long travels; and so that, with the help of a Glossary alone—to be placed at the end of the book—it might render the descriptions of Theophrastus's plants intelligible to anyone even moderately versed in the Greek language. Hence, it is also not to be despaired, as I observed above, that the errors of the text will be corrected in the progress of time through autopsia at the native location.

The Catalogue of Plants is presented in Greek-Latin, and also Latin-Greek, arranged in alphabetical order according to the nomenclature of Linnaeus.

Technical and less commonly used terms are marked with an asterisk: an explanation of these will be found in the Glossary. Words enclosed in brackets are not the author's...