Homer, Theophrastus, and Dioscorides mention the pear tree under the names ochnai, apios, or achras. The Latins called it pyrus or pirus,[1147] and cultivated a great number of varieties, at least in Pliny’s time. The mural paintings at Pompeii frequently represent the tree with its fruit.[1148]
The lake-dwellers of Switzerland and Italy gathered wild apples in great quantities, and among their stores pears are sometimes, but rarely, found. Heer has given an illustration of one which cannot be mistaken, found at Wangen or Robenhausen. It is a fruit narrowing towards the stalk, 28 mm. (about an inch and a half) long by 19 mm. (an inch) wide, cut longitudinally so as to show the small quantity of pulp as compared to the cartilaginous central part.[1149] None have been found in the lake-dwellings of Bourget in Savoy. In those of Lombardy, Professor Raggazzoni[1150] found a pear cut lengthways, 25 mm. by 16. This was at Bardello, Lago di Varese. The wild pears figured in Duhamel, Traité des Arbres, edit. 2, are 30 to 33 by 30 to 32 mm.; and those of Laristan, figured in the Jardin Fruitier du Muséum under the name P. balansæ, which seem to me to be of the same species, and undoubtedly wild, are 26 to 27 mm. by 24 to 25. In modern wild pears the fleshy part is a little thicker, but the ancient lake-dwellers dried their fruits after cutting them lengthways, which must have caused them to shrink a little. No knowledge of metals or of hemp is shown in the settlements where these were found; but, considering their distance from the more civilized centres of antiquity, especially in the case of Switzerland, it is possible that these remains are not more ancient than the Trojan war, or than the foundation of Rome.
I have mentioned three Greek and one Roman name, but there are many others; for instance, pauta in Armenian and Georgian; vatzkor in Hungarian; in Slav languages gruscha (Russian), hrusska (Bohemian), kruska (Illyrian). Names similar to the Latin pyrus recur in the Keltic languages; peir in Erse, per in Kymric and Armorican.[1151] I leave philologists to conjecture the Aryan origin of some of these names, and of the German Birn; I merely note their number and diversity as an indication of the very ancient existence of the species from the Caspian Sea to the Atlantic. The Aryans certainly did not carry pears nor pear pips with them in their wanderings westward; but if they found in Europe a fruit they knew, they would have given it the name or names they were accustomed to use, while other earlier names may have survived in some countries. As an example of the latter case, I may mention two Basque names, udarea and madaria,[1152] which have no analogy with any known European or Asiatic name. The Basques being probably the descendants of the conquered Iberians who were driven back to the Pyrenees by the Kelts, the antiquity of their language is very great, and it is clear that their names for the species in question were not derived from Keltic or Latin.
The modern area of the pear extending from the north of Persia to the western coast of temperate Europe, principally in mountainous regions, may therefore be considered as prehistoric, and anterior to all cultivation. It must be added, however, that in the north of Europe and in the British Isles an extensive cultivation must have extended and multiplied naturalizations in comparatively modern times which can scarcely be now distinguished.
I cannot accept Godron’s hypothesis that the numerous cultivated varieties come from an unknown Asiatic species.[1153] It seems that they may be ranked, as Decaisne says, either with P. communis or P. nivalis of which I am about to speak, taking into account the effect of accidental crossing, of cultivation, and of long-continued selection. Besides, Western Asia has been explored so thoroughly that it is probable it contains no other species than those already described.
Snow Pear—Pyrus nivalis, Jacquin.
This variety of pear is cultivated in Austria, in the north of Italy, and in several departments of the east and centre of France. It was named Pyrus nivalis by Jacquin[1154] from the German name Schneebirne, given to it because the Austrian peasants eat the fruit when the snow is on the ground. It is called in France Poirier sauger, because the under side of the leaves is covered with a white down which makes them like the sage (Fr. sauge). Decaisne[1155] considered all the varieties of P. nivalis to be derived from P. kotschyana, Boissier,[1156] which grows wild in Asia Minor. The latter in this case should take the name of nivalis, which is the older.
The snowy pears cultivated in France to make the drink called perry have become wild in the woods here and there.[1157] They constitute the greater number of the so-called “cider pears,” which are distinguished by the sour taste of the fruit independent of the character of the leaf. The descriptions of the Greeks and Romans are too imperfect for us to be certain if they possessed this species. It may be presumed that they did, however, since they made cider.[1158]
Sandy Pear, Chinese Pear—Pyrus sinensis, Lindley.[1159]
I have already mentioned this species, which is nearly allied to the common pear. It is wild in Mongolia and Mantchuria,[1160] and cultivated in China and Japan. Its fruit, large rather than good, is used for preserving. It has also been recently introduced into European gardens for experiments in crossing it with our species. This will very likely take place naturally.