TAA i.3.2.80.recto
Typewritten letter from Dr Thomas Archibald Sprague to Howard Carter regarding types of lotus flowers and papyrus.
© Griffith Institute,
University of Oxford
ROYAL BOTANIC GARDENS,
All communications should be addressed to KEW, SURREY.
THE DIRECTOR 25th August, 1933.
Dear Sir,
With reference to your visit to the Herbarium last
Wednesday, I have now looked up the literature relative/<ng> to
Lotus and Papyrus.
According to Schweinfurth, the Lotus of ancient Egypt
included a white waterlily (Nymphaea Lotus) and a blue one
(Nymphaea caerulea). Conrad, The Waterlilies, pp. 6-10, deals
with the identity of the Egyptian Lotus and says: "two species
are figured on the monuments and tombs, N. Lotus, the white
night-lotus (with broad petals rounded at the apex) and
N. caerulea, the blue diurnal one (with acute petals)." I take
it that the (creamy) white N. Lotus must be the "yelllow" water-
lily of which you spoke the other day.
In a young Nymphaea flower-bud only the four sepals are
visible from the outside. As the flower-bud opens a little
the outsides of the petals become<s> visible between the sepals.
If you wish to speak of the sepals and petals of the waterlily
collectively you may term them perianth-leaves.
The Asiatic Lotus, Nelumbo nucifera, appears not to
have been known in Egypt before the advent of the Persians:
"not until the Roman period did it find a place in Egyptian art".
Under separate cover I am sending you half an umbel of
the Papyrus (Cyperus Papyrus) with the various parts duly
labelled. The parts which you particularly wished to have
identified were the involucral bracts of the umbel, or (general)
bracts for short. Each umbel has a large number of primary
rays, and each ray ends in a partial umbel with its (partial)
bracts. Each ray of the partial umbel (secondary ray) ends in
a compound spike of flowers.
There
Dr. Howard Carter,
2 Princes Gate Court,
S.W.7.