Hayes and Garber - Cucurbit Breeding

INTRODUCTION 3
scientific thought, failed to interpret this phenomenon. Theophrastus,
for example, concludes that as other plants do not as
a rule exhibit the same phenomenon, the date tree is not an
example of real sexuality (Johnson, 1915).
Little was actually known of plant sexual processes until
comparatively recent times. The English physician Grew
(1676) further developed the suggestion of Sir Thomas Millington
that the stamens served as the male organs, by a hypothesis
regarding the process of fertilization. The only means of
demonstrating this phenomenon was by the experimental method.
FIG. 1. The date palm among the Assyrians.
"Design from the palace of Sargon at Khorsabad (eighth century B.C.) showing that
The
the male and female flowers of the date palm were clearly distinguished at that time.
worshiper in the middle is carrying a sprig of male or staminate flowers while the one at
the right bears female or pistillate blossoms. The drawings should be compared with the
photographs of actual flowers. The winged deity at the left, who is usually identified as
the Palm God, holds in his hand a cone which is thought to typify the spathe of the male
palm, and thus the principle of fertility in general." (After Johnson, 1915.)
The First Demonstration of Sex in Plants. Camerarius
isolated female
first made the experimental test by using
plants of the mulberry, by emasculating the castor bean and by
removing the stigmas from Indian corn. The results of these
experiments were reported in a letter to Professor Valentin, of
Giessen, written in 1694.
The following statement, made by Camerarius and found in
Ostwald's Klassiker, page 25, has been frequently quoted (Johnson
1915.)