'Et d'oliviers et de cipres,
Dont il n'a gaires ici pres;
Ormes y ot branchus et gros,
Et avec ce charmes et fos,
Codres droites, trembles et chesnes,
Erables haus, sapins et fresnes.'
Here ormes are elms; charmes, horn-beams; fos, beeches; codres, hasels; trembles, aspens; chesnes, oaks; erables, maples; sapins, firs; fresnes, ashes. Hence this list contains seven kinds of trees out of Chaucer's thirteen. See also the list of 21 trees in Kn. Tale, A 2921. Spenser has—
'The builder oake, sole king of forrests all.'
This tree-list is, in fact, a great curiosity. It was started by Ovid, Metam. x. 90; after whom, it appears in Seneca, Œdipus, 532; in
Lucan, Phars. iii. 440; in Statius, Thebaid, vi. 98; and in Claudian, De Raptu Proserpinae, ii. 107. Statius was followed by Boccaccio, Tes. xi. 22-24; Rom. de la Rose, 1361; Chaucer (twice); Tasso, Gier. Lib. iii. 73; and Spenser. Cf. Vergil, Æn. vi. 179.