Sisyrinchium Mauritanicum. The Barbary Nut.
There is another of this kinde, not differing from the former in any other notable part, but in the flower, which in this is of a delayed purplish red colour, hauing in each of the three lower leaues a white spot, in stead of the yellow in the former, but are as soone fading as they.
The Place.
The former doe grow very plentifully in many parts both of Spaine and Portugall, where Guillaume Boel, a Dutch man heretofore remembred often in this Booke, found them; of the sundry colours specified, whereas Clusius maketh mention but of one colour that he found.
The other was found in that part of Barbary, where Fez and Morocco do stand, and brought first into the Lowe-Countries: but they are both very tender, and will hardly abide the hard Winters of these colder regions.
The Time.
The first flowreth in May and Iune, the last not vntill August.
The Names.
The name Sisyrinchium is generally imposed vpon this plant, by all authors that haue written thereof, thinking it to bee the right Sisyrinchium of Theophrastus: but concerning the Spanish name Nozelha, which Clusius saith it is called by in Spaine, I haue beene credibly enformed by the aforenamed Boel, that this roote is not so called in those parts; but that the small or common stript Crocus is called Nozelha, which is sweete in taste, and desired very greedily by the Shepheards and Children, and that the roote of this Sisyrinchium or Spanish Nut, is without any taste, and is not eaten. And againe, that there is not two kindes, although it grow greater, and with more flowers, in those places that are neare the Sea, where both the washing of the Sea water, and the moisture and ayre of the Sea, causeth the ground to bee more fertile. This I thought good, from the true relation of a friend, to giue the world to vnderstand, that truth might expell errour.