c. A.D. 70.—"As touching the leafe of Nardus, it were good that we discoursed thereof at large, seeing that it is one of the principal ingredients aromaticall that goe to the making of most costly and precious ointments.... The head of Nardus spreadeth into certain spikes and ears, whereby it hath a twofold use both as spike and also as leafe."—Pliny (Ph. Holland), xii. 12.
c. A.D. 90.—"Κατάγεται δὲ δι' αὐτῆς (Οζηνῆς) καὶ ἀπὸ τῶν ἄνω τόπων, ἡ διὰ Πωκλαΐδος καταφερομένη νάρδος, ἡ Κασπαπυρηνὴ, καὶ ἡ Παροπανισηνὴ, καὶ ἡ Καβολίτη, καὶ ἡ διά τῆς παρακειμένης Σκυθίας."—Periplus, § 48 (corrected by Fabricius).
c. A.D. 545.—"... also to Sindu, where you get the musk or castorin, and androstachyn" (for nardostachys, i.e. spikenard).—Cosmas, in Cathay, p. clxxviii.
1563.—"I know no other spikenard (espique-nardo) in this country, except what I have already told you, that which comes from Chitor and Mandou, regions on the confines of Deli, Bengala, and the Decan."—Garcia, f. 191.
1790.—"We may on the whole be assured that the nardus of Ptolemy, the Indian Sumbul of the Persians and Arabs, the Jatámánsì of the Hindus, and the spikenard of our shops, are one and the same plant."—Sir W. Jones, in As. Res. ii. 410.
c. 1781.—
"My first shuts out thieves from your house or your room,
My second expresses a Syrian perfume;
My whole is a man in whose converse is shared
The strength of a Bar and the sweetness of Nard."—