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What is the plane-tree?

By Chelsie Vandaveer

September 13, 2002

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The plane-tree of Greek, Roman, and Hebrew legends was simply called Platanus. Botanically, this plane-tree is known as Platanus orientalis Linnaeus. The meaning of its ancient name is lost.

In The Herbal (1633 ed.), John Gerard wrote, "The Plane is a great tree, having very long and farre spreading boughs casting a wonderfull broad shadow...highly commended and esteemed among the old Romans...it beareth his name of the breadth." But Gray's Manual of Botany (1950) offers "The ancient name, from the Greek platys, broad, apparently referring to the large leaves."

Road Menders in a Lane With Heavy Plane Trees
Vincent van Gogh
Buy this Giclee Print at AllPosters.com

The plane was a tree of stories. The Old Testament says that for years, Jacob worked for Laban tending his flocks and increasing Laban's wealth. When he asked leave of his labors, Jacob requested as wages only those animals which did not have solid colored coats.

"And Jacob took him rods of fresh poplar, and of the almond and of the plane-tree; and peeled white streaks in them...And he set the rods...in the gutters of the watering-troughs where the flocks came to drink; And the flocks conceived at the sight of the rods, and the flocks brought forth streaked, speckled, and spotted." (Genesis 30: 37-39, Masoretic Text)

Legend says that Hippocrates II (Fifth Century BCE) taught medicine under a wide plane-tree on the island of Kos in the Mediterranean. Pliny the Elder recorded a famous plane-tree grew in the walks at the Academy of Athens and a celebrated plane [grew] in Lycia. Perhaps the most notorious belonged to Caligula.

"A third plane-tree is connected with the Emperor Gaius Caligula, who on an estate at Velitrae was impressed by the 'flooring' of a single plane-tree and the horizontal branches serving as seats; he held a banquet in the tree—the leaves provided partial awning—in a dining room spacious enough to hold fifteen guests and the servants. Caligula called this dining-room his 'eyrie'." (Pliny the Elder, Natural History, Book XII, pre-79 CE, trans. John F. Healy)

The Royal Botanical Garden, Kew has a fabulous photograph of Oriental Plane (Platanus orientalis), one of Kew's five 'old lions', standing in front of Kew Palace. To view this wonderful tree, click on the link:

http://www.rbgkew.org.uk/plants/trees/platanus_orientalis.html

killerPlants Tendrils: ~~1~~2~~3~~4~~5~~

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Comments: Must have well-drained soil. Short lived 25-50 years. Excessive summer heat can cause some problems

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Beautiful Tulip-Like Blooms

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