[481] Apologie pour Herodote, par H. Estiene. A la Haye, 1735, 2 vols. 8vo. [482] Meninski, in his Turkish Lexicon, has _Zae’ feran_, crocus. Golius gives it as a Persian word. That much saffron is still cultivated in Persia, and that it is of the best kind, appears from Chardin. See his Travels, printed at Rouen, 1723, 10 vols. 12mo. iv. p. 37. That the Spaniards borrowed the word _safran_ from the Vandals is much more improbable. It is to be found in Joh. Marianæ Histor. de Rebus Hispaniæ. Hagæ, 1733, fol. i. p. 147. The author, speaking of foreign words introduced into the Spanish language, says, “Vandalis aliæ voces acceptæ feruntur, _camara_, _azafran_,” &c. [483] Rozier, Cours complet d’Agriculture, i. p. 266. [484] It is reported at Saffron-Walden, that a pilgrim, proposing to do good to his country, stole a head of saffron, and hid the same in his palmer’s staff, which he had made hollow before on purpose, and so he brought this root into this realm, with venture of his life; for if he had been taken, by the law of the country from whence it came, he had died for the fact.--Hakluyt, vol. ii. p. 164. [485] Clusii Rar. Plant. Hist. 1601, fol. p. 207. [486] Traité de Police, par De la Mare, iii. p. 428. ALUM. This substance affords a striking instance how readily one may be deceived in giving names without proper examination. Our alum was certainly not known to the Greeks or the Romans; and what the latter called _alumen_[487] was vitriol, (the green sulphate of iron)[488]; not however pure, but such as forms in mines. To those who know how deficient the ancients were in the knowledge of salts, and of mineralogy in general, this assertion will without further proof appear highly probable[489]. Alum and green vitriol are saline substances which have some resemblance; both contain the same acid called the vitriolic or sulphuric; both have a strong astringent property, and on this account are often comprehended under the common name of styptic salts; and both are also not only found in the same places, but are frequently obtained from the same minerals. The difference, that the vitriols are combinations of sulphuric acid with a metallic oxide, either that of iron, copper or zinc, and alum on the other hand with a peculiar white earth, called on this account alumina, has been established only in modern times[490].