Derivation of the botanical name:
Gladiolus, Latin gladius, sword; gladiolus, small sword. So called by Pliny in reference to the plant's sword-shaped leaves.
italicus, Italian.
The standard author abbreviation Miller is used to indicate Philip Miller (1691 – 1771), a botanist of Scottish descent.
The standard author abbreviation Ger-Gawler is used to indicate John Bellenden Ker Gawler, originally John Gawler(1764 - 1842), an English botanist.
Theophrastus (370BCE — ca.285BCE), Historia Plantarum, book VII.12.3: "The root of the plant called corn-flag is sweet, and, if cooked and pounded up and mixed with the flour, makes the bread sweet and wholesome. It is round and without 'bark,' and has small offsets like the long onion. Many of them are found in moles' runs; for this animal likes them and collects them."
Pliny (23–79), Natural History, Book XXI. LXVII: "Some include among the class of bulbs Giadiobic
the root of the cypiros, that is, of the gladiolus. It ^phodei. makes a pleasant food, one which, when boiled, also
renders bread more palatable, and also when kneaded
with it more weighty.** Not unhke it is the plant
which is called thesium, and is acrid to the
taste.
LXVIII. The other plants of the same kind differ
in the leaf : asphodel has an oblong, narrow leaf ; the
squill one broad and flexible ; the gladiolus one that
its name suggests.^
^ Gladiolus, i.e., " little sword."
