Enquiry into Plants/Volume 1/Chapter 10

by Theophrastus

Of trees (principally) and their characteristic special differences: as to knots.

VIII. One may take it that the following are the differences between trees:—Some have knots, more or less, others are more or less without them, whether from their natural character or because of their position. But, when I say 'without knots,' I do not mean that they have no knots at all (there is no tree like that, but, if it is true of any plants, it is only of other kinds, such as rush bulrush galingale and plants of the lake side generally) but that they have few knots. Now this is the natural character of elder bay fig and all smooth-barked trees, and in general of those whose wood is hollow or of a loose texture. Olive fir and wild olive have knots; and some of these grow in thickly shaded windless and wet places, some in sunny positions exposed to storms and winds, where the soil is light and dry; for the number of knots varies between trees of the

^{[1] [2] [3]} same kind. And in general mountain trees have more knots than those of the plain, and those that grow in dry spots than those that grow in marshes.

Again the way in which they are planted makes a difference in this respect; those trees that grow close together are knotless and erect, those that grow far apart have more knots and a more crooked growth; for it happens that the one class are in shade, the others in full sun. Again the 'male' trees have more knots than the 'female' in those trees in which both forms are found, as cypress silver-fir hop-hornbeam cornelian cherry—for there is a kind called 'female cornelian cherry' (cornel)—and wild trees have more knots than trees in cultivation: this is true both in general and when we compare those of the same kind, as the wild and cultivated forms of olive fig and pear. All these have more knots in the wild state; and in general those of closer growth have this character more than those of open growth; for in fact the 'male' plants are of closer growth, and so are the wild ones; except that in some cases, as in box and nettle-tree, owing to the closer growth there are no knots at all, or only a few.

^[4]Again the knots of some trees are irregular and set at haphazard, while those of others are regular, alike in their distance apart and in their number, as has been said^[5]; wherefore also they are called 'trees with regular knots.'^{[6] [7]}For of some the knots are, as it were, at even distances, while in others the distance between them is greater at the thick end of the stem. And this proportion holds throughout. This is especially evident in the wild olive and in reeds—in which the joint corresponds to the knot in trees. Again some knots are opposite one another, as those of the wild olive, while others are set at random. Again some trees have double knots, some treble,^[8] some more at the same point; some have as many as five. ^[9]In the silver-fir both the knots and the smaller branches^[10] are set at right angles, as if they were stuck in, but in other trees they are not so. And that is why the silver-fir is such a strong tree.^[11] Most peculiar^[12] are the knots of the apple, for they are like the faces of wild animals; there is one large knot, and a number of small ones round it. Again some knots are blind,^[13] others productive; by 'blind' I mean those from which there is no growth. These come to be so either by nature or by mutilation, according as either the knot^[14] is not free and so the shoot does not make its way out, or, a bough having been cut off, the place is mutilated, for example by burning. Such knots occur more commonly in the thicker boughs, and in some cases in the stem also. And in general, wherever one chops or cuts part of the stem or bough, a knot is formed, as though one thing were made thereby into two and a fresh growing point produced, the cause being the mutilation or some other such reason; for the effect of such a blow cannot of course be ascribed to nature.

Again in all trees the branches always seem to have more knots, because the intermediate parts^[15] have not yet developed, just as the newly formed branches of the fig are the roughest,^[16] and in the vine the highest^[17] shoots. ^[18](For to the knot in other trees correspond the 'eye' in the vine, the joint in the reed). . . . . In some trees again there occurs, as it were, a diseased formation of small shoots, as in elm oak and especially in the plane; and this is universal if they grow in rough waterless or windy spots. Apart from any such cause this affection occurs near the ground in what one may call the 'head' of the trunk, when the tree is getting old.

Some trees again have what are called by some 'excrescences' (or something corresponding), as the - olive; for this name belongs most properly to that tree, and it seems most liable to the affection; and some call it 'stump, some krotone, others have a different name for it. It does not occur, or only occurs to a less extent, in straight young trees, which have a single root and no side-growths. To the olive also, both wild and cultivated, are peculiar certain thickenings in the stem.

 

1. conj. Bod.; UAId.H.; cf. 1. 5. 3.
2. conj. W.; Ald.
3. conj. Scal,; U; MVAId.
4. Plin. 16. 125.
5. 1. 8. 1.
6. ταξιόζωτα conj. W.; ἀξιολογώτατα Ald.; cf. ταξίφυλλος, 1. 10. 8.
7. Plin. 16. 122.
8. cf. 4. 4. 12.
9. Plin. 16. 122.
10. i.e. primary and secondary branches.
11. cf. 5. 2. 2.
12. Plin. 16. 124.
13. cf. Arist. de iuv. et sen. 3; Plin. 16. 125.
14. ὃταν . . . πηρωθῆ conj. W.; ἣ ὃταν ἡ μὴ λυθῇ καὶ ἐκβιάζηται καὶ ἡ ἀποκοπῇ καὶ U; ὃταν ἡ μὴ λυθῇ καὶ ἐκβιάζηται ἣ ἀποκοπῇ P; ἣ ὃταν λυθῇ καὶ ἐκβιάζηται ἣ ἀποκοπὴ καὶ οἱ οὐ P₂; ὃταν ἡ μὴ λυθῇ καὶ ἐκβιάζηται καὶ ἡ ἀποκοπῇ καὶ Ald.H.; G differs widely.
15. i.e. the internodes; till the branch is fully grown its knots are closer together, and so seem more numerous: μήπω τἀνὰ μέσον προσηυξῆσθαι conj. Sch.; μήπω τἀνὰ μέσον προσκυζῆθαι U; μήτ᾽ ἀνὰ μέσον προσκυξεῖσθαι MAld.; μήποτ᾽ ἀνάμεσον προσηυξῆσθαι P₂.
16. i.e. have most knots.
17. i.e. youngest.
18. Plin. 16. 125.

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