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it claspeth aboute what so ever stronge thynge it doth
tuche" (Herbal Part 1, p. 132), indicating the thin stems
of the plant which twine around the stems of other plants
as it grows. "Twig" today suggests stiffness as well as
slenderness, but obviously Turner I s stem was exactly the
opposite of stiff. In all his uses of "twig" he seems to
be concerned with a fine round slim stem, which may be
flexible or otherwise. He says that Agrimony has "young
twigges or wandes" (ibid., p. 181) growing out of the root
and these would certainly not be brittle in the modern
sense of a twig snapping, because they are the stems or
"whips" (in modern terminology) which grow out from the
stout underground rhizome. He writes of Clinopodium that
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it is "a lytle bushe full of twygges" (Herbal Part 1, p. 122),
presumably meaning a clump of fine stems, maybe the persis-
tence of stems from a previous year. The fineness or thin
quality which Turner wishes to impart is emphasised in his
description of Garlick leaves as "commyng furth lykf! grene
twigges" (ibid., p. 14) which is very apt. He does not
confuse them with twigs, since he is obviously confident in
his knowledge of the various parts of this plant. But he
is less sure and into some difficulties when describing
Lichen which he describes as having "a certayn litle twig
lyke as it were a stalke in the toppe where of are litle
thynges lyke sterres" (Herbal Part 2, fol. 36). ObViously