The Spanish trail
The history of the potato in Europe as become mixed up with unforgettable legends. Nevertheless, it seems to have arrived inadvertently in Spain in 1570 with a cargo of silver snatched from the New World. Monks from Seville grew it successfully to nourish the sick at their hospital. It was not long before the poor in the region had adopted it. It is likely that the potato travelled with the armies of Charles V and afterwards with those of Philip II. During the same period the Carmelites brought it to Italy but it was not much fancied there before 1873 when Filipo Baldini began to promote it.
 |
There is, however, clear evidence that botanists became interested in the plant. The French botanist Clusius assures us that it was cultivated in his country before 1587 and he sent specimens of it to his German and Austrian colleagues. Could it be that Gaspard Bauhin, member of the French family noted for its botanists, received the tuber from him? The fact remains that Bauhin's "Phytopinax", his first attempt towards a natural classification of plants, was published in 1595. In it the "papa's" offspring is scientifically called: "Solanum tuberosum". Bauhin introduced the potato into France where it became known as the "cartoufle", a name derived from the Italian "tartuffolo". In Germany this became "Kartoffel". In the Netherlands we meet up with it again as the "aardappel"(apple of the earth) which can be litterally translated into French as "pomme de terre". |
It seems that the Slavonic peoples learned about the potato from the Germans as their denominations for it are closely related to the word Kartoffel. At the end of the 17th century tsar Peter the Great brought the potato to Russia himself from the Netherlands where he had been studying shipbuilding. The Seven United Provinces of the Netherlands had indeed known about the tuber since the time of Clusius, but we will be able to follow its peregrinations throughout Holland later on.