“Spartus frutex virgosus sine foliis, ab asperitate vocatus; volumina enim funium, quæ ex eo fiunt, aspera sunt.” Originum L. xvii. c. 9.
This is the definition of a learned and observant author, who lived in Spain, and who must have been familiar with the facts. “Frutex virgosus sine foliis” is a clear and striking description of the Spanish Broom, the leaves of which are so small as easily to escape observation[209]. The Stipa Tenacissima, on the other hand, is not a shrub with twigs, but a grass, which grows in tufts, the long leaves being as abundant and useful as the stems or straws. Clusius himself (l. c.) in laying down the distinction between the Spartum of the Greeks, which he supposed to be the Spanish Broom, and the Spartum of Pliny, which he supposed to be the Stipa Tenacissima, asserts that the former is a shrub (frutex), the latter a herb with grassy leaves (herba graminacea folia proferens). It is clear, therefore, that the inhabitants of Spain in the time of Isidore still used the term Spartus in its original acceptation, viz. to denote the Spartium Junceum of Linnæus.
[209] Dioscorides also describes the Spanish Broom to be “a shrub bearing long twigs without leaves.” Isidore’s etymology, deducing Spartus from Asper, is manifestly absurd.
When the Stipa Tenacissima was brought into use for making ropes and for other purposes, for which the Spanish Broom was employed, the name of the latter would naturally be extended to the former, and we may thus account for the fact that the Stipa Tenacissima is now universally known in Spain by the name Esparto. Indeed it is possible, that the employment of the Stipa Tenacissima for these purposes may have been as ancient as the time of Pliny; and his use of the word “herba” in describing it, as well as the locality which he assigns to it, the hilly country about Carthage, favors the common interpretation, and perhaps even authorizes the conclusion, that his account is the result of confounding the two plants together, so that he says of one supposed plant things, which were partly true of both, and partly applicable either to the Spanish Broom, or to the Stipa Tenacissima only. But, even if this be admitted, it is still possible that the plant, from whose fibres the “pastorum vestis” was manufactured, was not the grassy Stipa, but the shrub, the Spanish Broom.
In order to establish this point we now proceed to mention the evidence respecting the application of it to such uses. It has been employed for making cloth in Turkey, in Italy, and the South of France, but in circumstances, which were either specially favorable to the manufacture, or where flax could not be cultivated. It is manufactured into shirts in Albania according to Dr. Sibthorp[210]. Nearly a century ago, Pope Benedict XIV. brought a colony of Albanians to inhabit a barren and desolate portion of his territory on the sea-coast. Here they obtained a very fine, strong, durable thread from the Broom and the Nettle, and used it, when woven, in place of linen[211]. Trombelli, who relates this fact, also gives an account of the manufacture of broom-bark in the vicinity of Lucca, where the hills, called Monte Cascia, are covered with this plant[212]. “Formerly,” he says, “the people derived no other advantage from the shrub than to feed sheep and goats with it, and to heat their stoves and furnaces. But their ingenuity and industry have now made it far more profitable. They steep the twigs for some days in the thermal waters of Bagno a Acqua near Lucca. After this process the bark is easily stript off, and it is then combed and otherwise treated like flax. It becomes finer than hemp could be made; it is easily dyed of any color, and may be used for garments of any kind[213].” In the vicinity of Pisa we find that the twigs of the Spanish Broom were in like manner soaked in the thermal waters, and that a coarse cloth was manufactured from the bark[214].
[210] Flora Græca, No. 671.
[211] Trombelli, Bononiensis Scient. atque Artium Instituti Commentarii, tom. vi. p. 118.
[212] Trombelli calls the plant Genista, and says it is the kind called by botanists “Genista juncea flore luteo.” This is the Spartium Junceum of Linnæus. See Ray, Catal. Stirp. Europ. and Scopoli, Flora Carniolica, 1772, tom. i. No. 870.
[213] Bononiensis Scientiarum atque Artium Instituti Commentarii, tom. iv. Bonon. 1757, p. 349-351. A similar account of the manufacture of the “Teladi Ginestia” at Bagno a Acqua is given by Mr. John Strange, who says he had sent an account of it to the Society for encouraging Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce. Lettera sopra l’Origine della carta naturale di Cortona, Pisa 1764. p. 79.
[214]Mém. de l’Académie des Sciences, Paris 1763.