Salix babylonica L.

Horticultural & Botanical History

‘Cultivated in South and Central Europe (Britain, Denmark, but not in Northern Scandinavia and Russia), and in most subtropical countries. Possibly wild in North China, Persia, and Kurdistan (the specimens collected by Kotschy are in leaf only). Introduced into Europe, the female tree only, and propagated by cuttings, in the seventeenth century, possibly earlier; represented by Benvenuto Cellini on a basin at Florence, executed in the sixteenth century. (Extracts from Targioni-Tozetti, historical notes on the introduction of various plants into Tuscany, in Journ. Hort. Soc. of London, ix. 1855, 177.) Not mentioned by classical writers. The Garab of the 137th Psalm, which Linnaeus considered the Weeping Willow, and called S. babylonica, was, as pointed out by C. Koch 1. c. 507, probably not a Willow, but Populus euphratica.’  [Stewart & Brandis - The Forest Flora of North-West and Central India p.465/1874].

Probably introduced to Europe in the 17th century, although Paxton’s Dictionary gives the date as 1730. 

History at Camden Park

Listed in all published catalogues [T.917/1843].

Notes