Gerard's Herbal - CHAP. 40. Of Coleworts.

Dioscorides maketh two kinds of Coleworts; the tame and the wild: but Theophrastus makes more kinds hereof; the ruffed or curled Cole, the smooth Cole, and the wild Cole. Cato imitating Theophrastus, setteth down also three Coleworts: the first he describeth to be smooth, great, broad-leaved, with a big stalk; the second ruffed; the third with little stalks, tender, and very much biting. The same distinction also Pliny maketh, in his twentieth book; and ninth chapter; where he saith, That the most ancient Romans have divided it into three kinds; the first roughed, the second smooth, and the third which is properly called Colewort. And in his nineteenth book he hath also added to these, other more kinds; that is to say, Tritianum, Cumanum, Pompeianum, Brutianum, Sabellium, and Lacuturrium.

The herbarists of our time have likewise observed many sorts, differing either colour or else in form; other headed with the leaves drawn together; most of them white, some of a deep green, some smooth-leaved, and others curled or ruffed; differing likewise in their stalks, as shall be expressed in their several descriptions.

1. The Garden Colewort hath many great broad leaves of a deep black green colour, mixed with ribs and lines of reddish and white colours: the stalk groweth out of the midst from among the leaves, branched with sundry arms bearing at the top little yellow flowers: and after they be past, there do succeed long cods full of round seed like those of the Turnip, but smaller, with a woody root having many strings or threads fastened thereto.

2. There is another lesser sort than the former, with many deep cuts on both sides even to the midst of the rib, and very much curled and roughed in the edges; in other things it differeth not.

3. The red kind of Colewort is likewise a Colewort of the garden, and differeth from the common in the colour of his leaves, which tend unto redness; otherwise very like.

4. There is also found a certain kind hereof with the leaves wrapped together into a round head or globe, whose head is white of colour, especially toward winter when it is ripe. The root is hard, and the stalks of a woody substance. This is the great ordinary Cabbage known everywhere, and as commonly eaten all over this kingdom.


Fig. 507. Red Cabbage Cole (5)	Fig. 508. Open Cabbage Cole (6)

5. There is another sort of Cabbage or loafed Colewort which hath his leaves wrapped together into a round head or globe, yet lesser than that of the white Cabbage, and the colour of the leaves of a lighter red than those of the former.

6. The open loafed Colewort hath a very great hard or woody stalk, whereupon do grow very large leaves of a white green colour, and set with thick white ribs, and gathereth the rest of the leaves closely together, which be lesser than those next the ground; yet when it cometh to the shutting up or closing together, it rather dilateth itself abroad, than closeth all together.

7. Double Colewort hath many great and large leaves, whereupon do grow here and there other small jagged leaves, as it were made of ragged shreds and jags set upon the smooth leaf, which giveth show of a plume or fan of feathers. In stalk, root, and every other part besides it doth agree with the Garden Colewort.

8. The double crisp or curled Colewort agreeth with the last before described in every respect, only it differeth in the leaves, which are so intricately curled, and so thick set over with other small cut leaves, that it is hard to see any part of the leaf itself, except ye take and put aside some of those jags and ragged leaves with your hand.


Fig. 509. Cauliflower (9)	Fig. 510. Swollen Colewort (10)

9. Cauliflower, or after some Cauliflower, hath many large leaves slightly indented about the edges, of a whitish green colour, narrower and sharper pointed than Cabbage: in the midst of which leaves riseth up a great white head of hard flowers closely thrust together, with a root full of strings; in other parts like unto the Coleworts.

10. The swollen Colewort of all other is the strangest, which I received from a worshipful merchant of London Master Nicholas Lete, who brought the seed thereof out of France; who is greatly in love with rare and fair flowers & plants, for which he doth carefully send into Syria, having a servant there at Aleppo, and in many other countries, for the which myself and likewise the whole land are much bound unto him.This goodly Colewort hath many leaves of a bluish green, or of the colour of Woad, bunched or swollen up about the edges as it were a piece of leather wet and broiled on a gridiron, in such strange sort that I cannot with words describe it to the full. The flowers grow at the top of the stalks, of a bleak yellow colour.The root is thick and strong like to the other kinds of Coleworts.

Fig. 511. Kinds of Colewort (11-15)

11. Savoy Cole is also numbered among the headed Coleworts or Cabbages. The leaves are great and large very like to those of the great Cabbage, which turn themselves upwards as though they would embrace one another to make a loafed Cabbage, but when they come to the shutting up they stand at a stay, and rather show themselves wider open, than shut any nearer together; in other respects it is like unto the Cabbage.

12. The curled Savoy Cole in every respect is like the precedent, saving that the leaves hereof do somewhat curl or crisp about the middle of the plant: which plant if it be opened in the spring time, as sometimes it is, it sendeth forth branched stalks, with many small white flowers at the top, which being past there follow long cods and seeds like the common or first kind described.

13. This kind of Colewort hath very large leaves deeply jagged even to the middle rib, in face resembling great and rank parsley. It hath a great and thick stalk of three cubits high, whereupon do grow flowers, cods, and seed like the other Coleworts.

14. The small cut Colewort hath very large leaves, wonderfully cut, hacked and hewn even to the middle rib, resembling a kind of curled parsley, that shall be described in his place, (which is not common nor hath not been known nor described until this time) very well agreeing with the last before mentioned, but differeth in the curious cutting and jagging of the leaves: in stalk flowers and seed not unlike.

15. Sea Colewort hath large and broad leaves, very thick and curled, and so brittle that they cannot be handled without breaking, of an overworn green colour, tending to greyness: among which rise up stalks two cubits high, bearing small pale flowers at the top; which being past there follow round knobs wherein is contained one round seed and no more, black of colour, of the bigness of a tare and a vetch: and therefore Pena and Lobel called it Brassica marina monospermos.

Fig. 517. Wild Colewort (16)

16. The Wild Colewort hath long broad leaves not unlike to the tame Colewort, but lesser, as is all the rest of the plant and is of his own nature wild and therefore not sought after as a meat, but is sown and husbanded up on ditch banks and such like places for the seeds' sake, by which oftentimes great gain is gotten.

The Place.

The greatest sort of Coleworts do grow in gardens, and do love a soil which is fat and thoroughly dunged and well manured: they do best prosper when they be removed, and every of them grow in our English gardens, except the wild; which groweth in fields and new digged ditch banks.

The sea Colewort groweth naturally upon the beach and brims of the sea, where there is no earth to be seen, but sand and rolling pebble stones, which those that dwell near the sea do call beach: I found it growing between Whitstable and the Isle of Thanet near the brink of the sea, and in many places near to Colchester and elsewhere by the seaside.

The Time.

Petrus Crescentius saith that the Colewort may be sown and removed at any time of the year; whose opinion I altogether mislike. It is sown in the spring, as March, April, and oftentimes in May, and sometimes in August, but the special time is about the beginning of September.

The Colewort, saith Columella, must be removed when it attaineth to six leaves, after it is come up from seed; the which must be done, in April or May, especially those that were sown in autumn; which afterwards flourish in the winter months, at what time, they are fittest for meat.

But the Savoy Cole, and the Cauliflower, must be sown in April, in a bed of hot horse-dung, and covered with straw or such like, to keep it from the cold, and frosty mornings; and when it hath gotten six leaves after this sort, then shall you remove him as aforesaid, otherwise if you tarry for temperate weather before you sow, the year will be spent, before it come to ripeness.

The Names.

The Apothecaries and the common herbarists do call it Cardis, of the goodness of the stalk: in the German tongue it is called Koole kraut: in French, des Choux: in English, Coleworts.

Cauliflower is called in Latin Brassica cypria, and cauliflora: in Italian, Cauliflore: it seemeth to agree with Brassica pompeiana of Pliny, whereof he writeth in his 19th book, and 8th chapter.

The Temperature.

All the Coleworts have a drying and binding faculty, with a certain nitrous or salt quality, whereby they mightily cleanse, either in the juice, or in the broth. The whole substance or body of the Colewort is of a binding and drying faculty, because it leaveth in the decoction this salt quality; which lieth in the juice and watery part thereof: the water wherein it is first boiled, draweth to itself all the quality; for which cause the decoction thereof looseth the belly, as doth also the juice of it, if it be drunk: but if the first broth in which it was boiled be cast away, then doth the Colewort dry and bind the belly. But it yieldeth to the body small nourishment, and doth not engender good, but a gross and melancholic blood. The white Cabbage is best next unto the Cauliflower; yet Cato doth chiefly commend the Russet Cole: but he knew neither the white ones, nor the Cauliflower; for if he had, his censure had been otherwise.

The Virtues.

A. Dioscorides teacheth, that the Colewort being eaten is good for them that have dim eyes, and that are troubled with the shaking palsy.

B. The same author affirmeth, that if it be boiled and eaten with vinegar, it is a remedy for those that be troubled with the spleen.

C. It is reported, that the raw Colewort being eaten before meat, doth preserve a man from drunkenness: the reason is yielded, for that there is a natural enmity between it and the vine, which is such, as if it grow near unto it, forthwith the vine perisheth and withereth away; yea, if wine be poured unto it while it is in boiling, it will not be any more boiled, and the colour thereof quite altered, as Cassius and Dionysius Uticensis do write in their books of tillage: yet doth not Athenæus ascribe that virtue of driving away drunkenness to the leaves, but to the seeds of Colewort.

D. Moreover, the leaves of Coleworts are good against all inflammations, and hot swellings; being stamped with barley and meal, and laid upon them with salt: and also to break carbuncles.

E. The juice of Coleworts, as Dioscorides writeth, being taken with Fleur-de-Lys and nitre, doth make the belly soluble, and being drunk with wine, it is a remedy against the bitings of venomous beasts.

F. The same being applied with the powder of Fenugreek, taketh away the pain of the gout, and also cureth old and foul ulcers.

G. Being conveyed into the nostrils, it purgeth the head: being put up with barley meal it bringeth down the flowers.

H. Pliny writeth, that the juice mixed with wine, and dropped into the ears, is a remedy against deafness.

I. The seed, as Galen saith, driveth forth worms, taketh away freckles of the face, sun-burning, and what thing soever that need to be gently scoured or cleansed away.

K. They say that the broth wherein the herb hath been sodden is marvellous good for the sinews and joints, and likewise for cankers in the eyes, called in Greek Carcinomata, which cannot be healed by any other means, if they be washed therewith.

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