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long stalke very round leves, almost as round, as garden
135
foliot ... and very fat, and thick, and bytter in taste, & surn-
thyng saltysh with a manifest hete. The leves that cum not
streight way from the rootes, as the fyrst do, but out of the
stalke, are longer much, then the other" (ibid., pp. 75-76).
Turner concludes that Ruellius wrongly described the leaves
of Saldanell as "thyn" because he had not seen the fat leaves
of the young plant. (However, it must also be admitted that
Goodyer translates Dioscorides as saying Saldanell has "thinne
leaves", p. 161). Years later, Turner warns similarly of Rali
that "The older that the herbe is, the longer are the leaves"
(Herbal Part 3, p. 37).
From this kind of patient, long-term scrutiny he has
learned that laurel leaves are "blackishe grene" when old and
"curled about the edges" (Herbal Part 2, foL 32); that Juniper
berries are "first grene and afterwarde blacke" (ibid., fol.
25); and that though he has "marked" Crobanche (Darnel) many
years, "I colde never se any lefe upon it" (ibid., fol. 71 v ).
He also comments that in a cold year Throwwaxe seed comes
much later (Herbal Part 1, p. 125).
Perhaps one of the most interesting examples illustra-
ting the thoroughness of his observations is found in his
discussion on Epimedum, a herb which Turner describes as
"strange and yll to fynde":
h:1N be it I foond a certaine herbe in Germany J:esyde the
Bysb:::p of COlens place: called Popelsdop, by a brakes syde
very well agreeyng in all f:OYOtes, savyng in roe with tb:!
description that Dios=ides maketh of epin'edun. In the
m::neth of July I sa"-€ thys herbe, havyng ix. or. x. leves
o::nJyng out of an roote, very like to our march violet leves,