The saffron was cultivated in very early times in the west of Asia. The Romans praised the saffron of Cilicia, which they preferred to that grown in Italy.[805] Asia Minor, Persia, and Kashmir have been for a long time the countries which export the most. India gets it from Kashmir[806] at the present day. Roxburgh and Wallich do not mention it in their works. The two Sanskrit names mentioned by Piddington[807] probably applied to the substance saffron brought from the West, for the name _kasmirajamma_ appears to indicate its origin in Kashmir. The other name is _kunkuma_. The Hebrew word _karkom_ is commonly translated saffron, but it more probably applies to carthamine, to judge from the name of the latter in Arabic.[808] Besides, the saffron is not cultivated in Egypt or in Arabia. The Greek name is _krokos_.[809] Saffron, which recurs in all modern European languages, comes from the Arabic _sahafaran_,[810] _zafran_.[811] The Spaniards, nearer to the Arabs, call it _azafran_. The Arabic name itself comes from _assfar_, yellow. Trustworthy authors say that _C. sativus_ is wild in Greece[812] and in the Abruzzi mountains in Italy.[813] Maw, who is preparing a monograph of the genus Crocus, based on a long series of observations in gardens and in herbaria, connects with _C. sativus_ six forms which are found wild in mountainous districts from Italy to Kurdistan. None of these, he says,[814] are identical with the cultivated variety; but certain forms described under other names (_C. Orisnii_, _C. Cartwrightianus_, _C. Thomasii_), hardly differ from it. These are from Italy and Greece. The cultivation of saffron, of which the conditions are given in the _Cours d’Agriculture_ by Gasparin, and in the _Bulletin de la Société d’Acclimatation_ for 1870, is becoming more and more rare in Europe and Asia.[815] It has sometimes had the effect of naturalizing the species for a few years at least in localities where it appears to be wild. CHAPTER IV. PLANTS CULTIVATED FOR THEIR FRUITS.[816] +Sweet Sop, Sugar Apple+[817]—_Anona squamosa_, Linnæus. (In British India, +Custard Apple+; but this is the name of _Anona muricata_ in America.) The original home of this and other cultivated Anonaceæ has been the subject of doubts, which make it an interesting problem. I attempted to resolve them in 1855. The opinion at which I then arrived has been confirmed by the subsequent observations of travellers, and as it is useful to show how far probabilities based upon sound methods lead to true assertions, I will transcribe what I then said,[818] mentioning afterwards the more recent discoveries.