While the records are somewhat vague it is probable that the Domestica plums came from the region about the Caucasus Mountains and the Caspian Sea and especially the section east of these mountains and the sea. What seems to be the wild form of this species has been found by several botanists in this great region.[9] Here the Huns, Turks, Mongols and Tartars, flowing back and forth in tides of war-like migration, maintained in times of peace a crude agriculture probably long before the Greeks and Romans tilled the soil. The plum was one of their fruits and the dried prune a staple product. Here, still, to the east, west and north toward central Asia, plums are among the common fruits and prunes are common articles of trade. Even in the fertile oases of the great central Asian desert, plums are cultivated, but whether domesticated here or brought from elsewhere cannot be told. Koch,[10] speaking of prunes in particular, gives the following account (translated) of their Asiatic origin: “According to my investigation Turkestan and the southern Altai Mountains are the place of origin. When in the year 1844 I found myself in Baku on the west coast of the Caspian Sea, I had plenty of opportunity to draw accounts of the fruits of their native lands from the Turkestan and Bokharan merchants, and was astonished over the high cultivation of stone fruits in these places—at the same time I was able to taste dried the most choice because best flavored, the Ali-Bokhara, that is Bokhara prune. Some of these Bokharan prunes were transplanted a long time ago to Trans-Caucasia and were especially cultivated in the ancient city and residence of the Ruler of the modern Elizabethpol. Unfortunately the cultivation is less now than in earlier times. A further spread toward the west and toward Europe, I have not been able to follow. In Greece, the prunes are even to-day an unknown fruit.” At about the time Pliny wrote, or somewhat before, communication had been opened between the Romans and the countries about the Caspian Sea, and a few centuries later the devastating hordes of Asiatics came westward and for several centuries continued to pour into eastern Europe. What more probable than that they should have carried dried prunes as an article of food in the invasions, and eventually, as they made settlements here and there, have introduced the trees in Europe. It is certain, at any rate, as we shall see, that several of the groups of cultivated plums trace back to the Balkan countries of Europe and the region eastward. There, now as then, the plum is a standard fruit and prune-making a great industry.