Vegetable Lamb of Tartary
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The Vegetable Lamb of Tartary (Latin: Agnus scythicus or Planta Tartarica Barometz) is a legendary plant of central Asia, believed to grow sheep as its fruit.[1] The sheep were connected to the plant by an umbilical cord and grazed the land around the plant. When all the plants were gone, both the plant and sheep died.
Although it owed its currency in medieval thought as a way of explaining the existence of cotton, underlying the myth is a real plant, Cibotium barometz, a fern of the genus Cibotium.[1] It was known under various other names including the Scythian Lamb, the Borometz, Barometz and the Borametz (pronounced Baranetz, from Russian baran (ram)).[citation needed] This plant produces a woolly mass supported by a number of stems.[1] The Tradescant Museum of Garden History has one under glass.
[edit] Cultural references
A plant called Borometz is mentioned in Chapter 22 of Simplicius Simplicissimus, a picaresque novel by Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen, when the protagonist describes his abduction by Tartars.
The Vegetable Lamb of Tartary appears on the album cover of Guided by Voices' Vampire on Titus.
In the PlayStation 2 game Odin Sphere, Baromett seeds can be planted and grow to be plants that bear two sheep.
In the science fiction novel Evolution by Stephen Baxter, plants called "borametz trees" by the author have developed a symbiotic relationship with the semi-sentient descendants of humanity that nest within their fiber-filled seedpods. They provide food, shelter and protection to their tenants, who in return tend to the trees and seek out water, minerals and other crucial substances on the barren plains of Pangaea Ultima.
[edit] References
- ^ a b c Large, Mark F.; John E. Braggins (2004). Tree Ferns [ILLUSTRATED]. Portland, Oregon: Timber Press, Incorporated. pp. 360. ISBN 978-0881926309.
[edit] External links
- Legend of the Lamb-Plant
- Vegetable Lamb at pantheon.org
- Note to Sir Thomas Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica, III.28
