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Pale Smartweed (Polygonum lapathifolium L.) and Other Polygonums

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 June 2017

Larry W. Mitich
Larry W. Mitich*
Affiliation:
Department of Vegetable Crops, University of California, Davis, CA 95616
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Extract

The name Polygonum is a very ancient derivative, composed of the two Greek words, polys, many, and gony, knee or joint, alluding to the numerous and conspicuous nodes in the stems of many species. The Greek physician Heraclides Tarentina (third and second centuries BC) prescribed prostrate knotweed, P. aviculare L., as a remedy against bleeding from the ear. Dioscorides, a Greek botanist, was the first to characterize Polygonum as having “numerous slender branches, creeping on the ground like grass, with fruit at each leaf.” Subsequently, other Greek physicians, poets, and botanists applied the name to the knotweed/smartweed group, and in 1753, Linneaus adopted it for the genus. The species name for pale smartweed, lapathifolium, is from lapathi, meaning sorrel-like or dock-like (Gledhill 1985; Hyam and Pankhurst 1995; Small 1895).

Type
Intriguing World of Weeds
Information
Weed Technology , Volume 12 , Issue 3 , September 1998 , pp. 560 - 562
Copyright
Copyright © 1998 by the Weed Science Society of America 

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References

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