Family: Rosaceae
Alien
introductions
Bullaces (Prunus
domestica subsp. insititia),
Damsons (Prunus domestica subsp. insititia), Greengages (Prunus domestica subsp. italica) and Cherry plums (Prunus cerasifera) and the classic
domestic plums (Prunus domestica
subsp. domestica) appear to have been
introduced into Britain as cultigens (Woldring 2000; Zohary et al. 2012:
140-143). However, they are now found growing in hedgerows right across the
British Isles, sometimes self-sown and naturalised, but more often planted by
earlier generations of rural cottage gardeners and land-owners (for
distribution maps see Online Atlas of the British and Irish Flora).
Pliny the elder in his ‘Historia
Naturalis’[i] (c. AD
77-79) writes that plums were initially introduced into Greece and Italy from
Syria (see additional references in Jashemski et al. 2002: 148-149; Woldring
2000: 536, 548). They were introduced into central and northern Europe much
later, probably during the Crusades, when they were once again imported from
the Near East; for example, the ‘damson-plum’ (or ‘damascene’) was apparently
introduced into Europe from Damascus or Jerusalem by the Duke of Anjou after
the fifth crusade (1198-1204; Davidson 2014: 246). In this regard, however, it
is intriguing that the name ‘bullace’ in English is cognate with its Celtic
counterparts: e.g., the Welsh: ‘bwlas’ (Geiriadur
Prifysgol Cymru (A dictionary of the Welsh language) 1953), Old Breton: ‘bolos’ (Troude, 1842:
437) and Irish ‘bulistair’ (O’Reilly 1821), each of which it is assumed has origins predating the crusades.
Complex inter-relationships
Bullaces (including damsons), Greengages and the many forms
of domestic plum are all assignable to one of three subspecies of a single
species: Prunus domestica, and they
are fully inter-fertile (Faust 2011; Watkins 1995; Woldring 2000). However,
they are often difficult to distinguish from the various Cherry plums (for examples
of the range of fruit morphologies see Botu et al. 2012; Faust 2011: figure 1).
Indeed, after outlining some of the complex inter-relationships between the
many species of wild and cultivated plums in Europe and beyond, Zohary et al.
(2012: 142) make the following statement:
“In conclusion, the 6x
P. domestica plums seem to be closely related to the 2x, 4x and 6x P.
cerasifera. Together they form what seems to be a P. cerasifera – P. domestica
polyploid crop complex. If wild forms of 6x P. domestica existed in south-east
Europe and/or south-west Asia prior to domestication (and they probably did),
they should be regarded as the ancestral stock for the development of the fruit
crop. However, if as some botanists believe, domestica plums evolved only under
cultivation the plausible principal progenitor is the P. cerasifera aggregate.”
Budding and grafting
To maintain their favoured varieties, those importing the plums
would have had to propagate them vegetatively (Webster 1995). They could have
done this either firstly by transplanting the saplings with carefully wrapped
root-balls and, if necessary, already budded and grafted with the desired
varieties, or secondly by importing freshly-cut shoots of the cultivar steeped
in water from which they could then quickly excise bud-grafts or cut scions for
grafting onto rootstocks of compatible wild species, just as farmers in Turkey
do today with vast numbers of the plum, cherry, pear and apple-trees growing in
the wild (Bolat et al. 2017). Of the native trees of Britain available as
rootstocks, apparently the most compatible would have been Blackthorn (Prunus spinosa).
Feral forms and
survivors
Since being introduced imported plums have seeded themselves
in many locations across the British Isles, most commonly in southeastern
England, but occasionally as far north as southern Scotland. Propagation by
seed is likely to have selected for the re-emergence of some archaic, wild-type
characteristics including sharper flavours. However, many of the more ancient
fruit trees in our hedgerows are venerable survivors either from the once carefully
husbanded gardens of long–forgotten cottages, or from the hedgerow planting of
fruit trees by large estates, which thereby provided fruits for their tenants
without needing to devote land to orchards. Such trees sometimes represent
domestic varieties that are today rarely cultivated.
Feral forms of plum are seldom spiny and they have ‘showy’
flowers with pedicels that have, at most, a few sparse hairs. The fruits are lop-sided
with a marked, one-sided groove and the flesh separates cleanly from the smooth,
flattish stone; they are usually sweet and juicy,
Uses
All plum varieties have fruits that are (or were) traditionally
eaten fresh, roasted or stewed, dried as ‘prunes’, or used to prepare fruit
leathers (Plants For A Future [PFAF] database;
see also Lim 2012: 463-475). In Turkey certain varieties are also eaten while
still green (‘can eriği’, green plum)
and while the stone is still soft so that the whole fruit can be eaten, normally
with a pinch of salt[ii].
As with cherry trees, the congealed gums that exude
copiously wherever the bark is wounded are reported to be both edible and
nutritious. In all the fruits the ripe kernel within the stone contains the
bitter, cyanogenic glucoside called amygdalin (Bolarinwa et al. 2014), and is
poisonous unless thoroughly crushed and roasted (see entries for Blackthorn and
Bird Cherry).
Prehistoric and
historic usage
Many authors have commented on
the fact that the morphological features of Prunus
fruitstones are useful for distinguishing between species and varieties
(Depypere et al. 2009; Woldring 2000; Ucchesu et al. 2017), and as the stone (or
endocarp) is the part of the fruit that most commonly survives on
archaeological sites this enables identifications beyond genus level to be made.
As Woldring (2000: 537-538) notes:
“Of all the
identification marks, the features of the stones seem the most stable
characteristics.” And he cites Hedrick (1911), who states: "In describing the several hundred
forms of plums for The Plums of New York, the stone has been quite as satisfactory if not the most satisfactory,
of any of the organs of this plant for distinguishing the various species and
varieties".
Ucchesu et al. (2017) use comparative
morphometric studies of fruitstones from modern populations on Sardinia and
ancient waterlogged specimens from the site of Santa Giusta (dated to the
Phoenician and Punic periods, 6th-2nd centuries BC) to identify
wild (Prunus spinosa) and domestic (Prunus domestica) species. Their
findings have an added significance because they are able to conclude that the Prunus stones found at Santa Giusta are
evidence of the earliest cultivated plums on Sardinia and, more importantly, also
in Italy.
A majority of archaeological
records for Prunus are Roman and post-Roman[iii],
although there are earlier sites in Europe where remains of plums (e.g., Cherry
plums, Damsons) have been identified (see Kroll 1998: 41; Faust 2011: 158-159,
table 2; Ucchesu et al. 2017: table 1; Zohary et al. 2012: 142)[iv].
There are also early pictorial depictions of plums, for example in Roman wall
paintings. Jashemski et al. (2002: 148-149) describe images of plums found at
Pompeii: in the House of the Fruit Orchard[v],
where several trees with different coloured fruits are illustrated; in the House
of Trebius Valens[vi], in which a
bird with two purple plums are shown (Jashemski et al. 2002: figure 133); and on
buried fragments of a wall painting in the House of the Gold Bracelet[vii]
that shows a branch with two yellow plums (Jashemski et al. 2002: figure 134). Also,
at the nearby ancient site of Oplontis[viii]
in the Villa of Poppaea there is a wall painting of quinces and blue and purple
plums in a glass bowl (Jashemski et al. 2002: figure 88).
Bibliography
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[i] Pliny the Elder. Historia
Naturalis. English translation by H Rackham: Loeb Classical Library (1950).
[iii] For more details on Roman
and post-Roman sites with Prunus
remains see references in Greig 1995/6; Kroll 1998, Faust 2011; Ucchesu et al.
2017; van der Veen et al. 2008; Willcox 1977; Zohary et al. 2012).
[iv] The criteria used to
identify the Prunus species on sites
that pre-date the Roman period are not given in these secondary sources.
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