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=== The Palm of Egypt ==
Finding myself for various months in the most beautiful countryside of Basso – Egypt, owned by the late Mr. Serra and adorned with six thousand Palms sown by him, I had the idea of getting information from the indigenous people on something that is ignored in Europe, about this majestic, unique, and most useful plant.

=== Sowing/Planting of the Kernel ===
''''Naua-el-ballah Glu' Nauaja'''' (date pits) are distinguished by an external making from which the ''''Male or Female'''' tree is born, but it seems in general that they have disregarded this advantageous difference. Even many families of eastern Egypt, many farmers and even vendors of this fruit, ensure that the pits that are of the opposite part from the longitudinal DICIZIONE that have a small round circle with a point in the center; the ones that are sowed produce fruit bearing trees (that is ''''female'''') and from the other pits without the distinction produce ''''male'''' trees, which flower but do not bear fruit. 
Planted during autumn in fertile soil and irrigated after around fifteen days, the pit begins to germinate; at a month, it produces some small leaves which remain long, narrow, and grooved lengthwise until around eight months, and there are no more than five or six of these leaves which vary in height depending on how favorable the circumstances of the terrain are by one or two palms. 
===Metamorphosis of the Leaves  ===
At this previously mentioned age, these leaves, joined like the blade of a spear and all the same shape, change their form, splitting apart at their grooves like a compass; positioned one within the other to form a branch adorned with narrow, long, and TERRUCINANTI leaves with very sharp thorns. 
Each month the plant forms one of these branches, destroys the previous ones, and the more it grows the more branches it produces in the span of a year.  
At this age, the branches grow to fifty to one hundred centimeters long and have a diameter of around a meter, but the trunk grows very little and remains short. 
===  How to Recognize the Age of a Palm ===
Recognizing the age of a palm is not an unsolved problem, but the plant's range of development can be misleading. This is seen by the palms that are twenty to thirty feet tall and twenty to thirty years old, compared to others that are five feet tall and the same age. 
It is said that the palm lives for two to three centuries and grows in the Memfi region, to as tall as eighty to one hundred feet. To know a Palm's true age, one does not count the number of GERIT cuts as many believe, but rather (in general) four cuts, one on top of the other, equals one year, since around there are so many cuts around the plant.
===The Various Forms of a Palm ===
Farmed palms generally have a cylindrical trunk, but some vary in being a straight, cone-shaped, or backwards; one sees from the perforations in different parts of the trunks, from others areas that are thin and worn out at a certain height, and at times in forests when they are abandoned and create offspring, a kind of beneficial shady area in oases, the external plants bend towards the ground, they produce a root at the halfway point of the trunk, and little by little it curves towards the center to form a semi-circle shaped tree. 
===Circumcision of the Palm  ===
As soon as one wants to regenerate the trunk of palm that is weak or deficient, they make holes in the trunk at a meter around the GERIT and stick various pieces of wood in them. They put silt from the Nile all around these pieces of wood, and they frequently dampen it. They leave it until the next year, until the season when it has formed new roots; then they cut the trunk underneath the silt, uproot the old one, and transplant the top so that the plant and what is called the ''''Tahara'''' (circumcision) are regenerated. 
===The Difficulty in Recognizing the Sex of a Palm  ===
It is known to be impossible to tell the sex of a palm before it flowers. The famous Mohamed Aly, who was heavily engaged in the well-being of Egypt, had promised a large reward to whoever could tell the if a palm was male or female before it flowered; he questioned all the gardeners and none could say. Mr. Serra told me that a boastful Arab, who was a gardener from Lake Edko,  came to his town and boasted that by looking at the branches, he could tell the sex of the plant. Mr. Serra sent for a branch of a male tree to be brought, keeping the so-called expert at his house to show it to him. He said it was female, they laughed in his face, but he was unperturbed, like a con artist used to the jeers, excused/justified himself with the usual ''''maalesc'''' (it does not matter) and so he proved what the great prince wanted, and before the SICITURA nothing is known.
=== Great Diversity in the Season When the Palm Flourishes  ===
The unique palm pant has not established a season to produce flowers, since one year it will bloom, the next it will not, and it might the third; it varies greatly – there are some palms that show signs of their sex at two, three and five years of age, and others that do not until eight, ten, fifteen and twenty years. 
=== The Season of Flowering  ===
Some palms flower in February, but generally they do so in March then continue throughout April and for part of May. 
=== Marriage of the Palm ===
The two sexes are known to flower, though the flowers of the male or those of the female may be in the ''''cuss'''' (vase) or a kind of pouch from which then the female's are also produced. They are the same as the male's but longer and thinner, and it is from the male pouch, by a tradition of the wise ancient Egyptians, that the hard-working Arab man–who obtains the biggest and best fruit–cuts the ''''Dakar'''' (the male flower), splits it into various pieces, and puts one in the center of the ''''Nitaie'''' (the female flower). He then ties it so it does not fall and so that the air, agitating them both, lets dust into the female flowers to fertilize them, creating a forced marriage instead of waiting for the random arrival of the season's winds, and this way one male can fertilize hundreds of females.
The pollen of the male palm smells similar to its sperm, so the Arabs thought of it as an aphrodisiac and they would sometimes eat it. 
The female pollen was able to be fertilized by the male from a far distance because of a strong, fundamental attraction coming from the universe. As a result of this phenomenon, there would be fruit in Europe if this procedure was carried out. 
=== Metamorphosis of the Palm ===
I was assured by many palm growers that they have seen a male plant become female, and have seen some become hermaphroditic; in Arabic, ''''Hente'''' ,that is, ''''half male and half female.''''
=== Proliferation of the Palm  ===
Both the males and females multiply substantially, and these POLOVI (offspring) always belong to the plant that created them. The father and its offspring, and the mother and its offspring, flower simultaneously; one always notices that the POLLOVI (of an offspring) leaves do not produce like those born from a kernel, rather, they are like the adult palm. Generally, the offspring of the female are transplanted and those of the male are destroyed. 
The palm is not receptive to all transplants because if any of its extremities are cut, it dies instantly. 
=== A Coptic Tale ===
It is tradition for Coptic and Arabic farmers of palms that the male plant has a VISCICA (bladder) under its root, the same as that of animals known as ''''Bedten'''' (two eggs), and by removing it, the male becomes female. 
I dug up the ground of various palms of different developmental stages and I found nothing. And if they were lost during the transplantation these trees would all be female, and if this were true, they would all extract the eggs of the male to make it female, given that one of them is enough to fertilize many. In the end, the (SPREUDICATI ?) of mid-Egypt would want a male palm, make it an immovable man, and others of the Basso, almost as though they were more moral, say ''''Kalam battal di'''' and this and speaking badly, that is, wanting to say that it is not true; but everyone maintains that no one finds it. 
=== Cultivation of the Palm===
In some small, abandoned oases in the Arabic desert, I saw some palm groves which had all of their branches that nature had given them, and so they had a strange and awkward appearance.  The cultivated palm has a thin, sturdy appearance and grows larger each year. The ''''gerit'''' (branches) are cut, and the industrious Arab creates so many useful domestic objects out of them that there would be too many to list. 
Around the top of the trunk, the large parts of the cut branches are left in order to tether the heavy bunches. These branches, called ''''Gahf'''', are cut the year after. They are either burned or made into ''''magascia'''' (brooms). Under the ''''gahf'''' there is ''''eldiffa'''', a cinnamon-colored canvas that is beautifully outlined by nature, out of which various kinds of ropes are made. It is possible that this material gave primitive men the idea to weave and create the first articles of clothing; only one piece of this fabric is enough to cover oneself, which is something even barbarians did, as seen by the peoples at the first flood gates.

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= The Palm of Egypt

Finding myself for various months in the most beautiful countryside of Basso – Egypt, owned by the late Mr. Serra and adorned with six thousand Palms sown by him, I had the idea of getting information from the indigenous people on something that is ignored in Europe, about this majestic, unique, and most useful plant.

Sowing/Planting of the Kernel

'Naua-el-ballah Glu' Nauaja' (date pits) are distinguished by an external making from which the 'Male or Female' tree is born, but it seems in general that they have disregarded this advantageous difference. Even many families of eastern Egypt, many farmers and even vendors of this fruit, ensure that the pits that are of the opposite part from the longitudinal DICIZIONE that have a small round circle with a point in the center; the ones that are sowed produce fruit bearing trees (that is 'female') and from the other pits without the distinction produce 'male' trees, which flower but do not bear fruit. Planted during autumn in fertile soil and irrigated after around fifteen days, the pit begins to germinate; at a month, it produces some small leaves which remain long, narrow, and grooved lengthwise until around eight months, and there are no more than five or six of these leaves which vary in height depending on how favorable the circumstances of the terrain are by one or two palms.

Metamorphosis of the Leaves

At this previously mentioned age, these leaves, joined like the blade of a spear and all the same shape, change their form, splitting apart at their grooves like a compass; positioned one within the other to form a branch adorned with narrow, long, and TERRUCINANTI leaves with very sharp thorns. Each month the plant forms one of these branches, destroys the previous ones, and the more it grows the more branches it produces in the span of a year. At this age, the branches grow to fifty to one hundred centimeters long and have a diameter of around a meter, but the trunk grows very little and remains short.

How to Recognize the Age of a Palm

Recognizing the age of a palm is not an unsolved problem, but the plant's range of development can be misleading. This is seen by the palms that are twenty to thirty feet tall and twenty to thirty years old, compared to others that are five feet tall and the same age. It is said that the palm lives for two to three centuries and grows in the Memfi region, to as tall as eighty to one hundred feet. To know a Palm's true age, one does not count the number of GERIT cuts as many believe, but rather (in general) four cuts, one on top of the other, equals one year, since around there are so many cuts around the plant.

The Various Forms of a Palm

Farmed palms generally have a cylindrical trunk, but some vary in being a straight, cone-shaped, or backwards; one sees from the perforations in different parts of the trunks, from others areas that are thin and worn out at a certain height, and at times in forests when they are abandoned and create offspring, a kind of beneficial shady area in oases, the external plants bend towards the ground, they produce a root at the halfway point of the trunk, and little by little it curves towards the center to form a semi-circle shaped tree.

Circumcision of the Palm

As soon as one wants to regenerate the trunk of palm that is weak or deficient, they make holes in the trunk at a meter around the GERIT and stick various pieces of wood in them. They put silt from the Nile all around these pieces of wood, and they frequently dampen it. They leave it until the next year, until the season when it has formed new roots; then they cut the trunk underneath the silt, uproot the old one, and transplant the top so that the plant and what is called the 'Tahara' (circumcision) are regenerated.

The Difficulty in Recognizing the Sex of a Palm

It is known to be impossible to tell the sex of a palm before it flowers. The famous Mohamed Aly, who was heavily engaged in the well-being of Egypt, had promised a large reward to whoever could tell the if a palm was male or female before it flowered; he questioned all the gardeners and none could say. Mr. Serra told me that a boastful Arab, who was a gardener from Lake Edko, came to his town and boasted that by looking at the branches, he could tell the sex of the plant. Mr. Serra sent for a branch of a male tree to be brought, keeping the so-called expert at his house to show it to him. He said it was female, they laughed in his face, but he was unperturbed, like a con artist used to the jeers, excused/justified himself with the usual 'maalesc' (it does not matter) and so he proved what the great prince wanted, and before the SICITURA nothing is known.

Great Diversity in the Season When the Palm Flourishes

The unique palm pant has not established a season to produce flowers, since one year it will bloom, the next it will not, and it might the third; it varies greatly – there are some palms that show signs of their sex at two, three and five years of age, and others that do not until eight, ten, fifteen and twenty years.

The Season of Flowering

Some palms flower in February, but generally they do so in March then continue throughout April and for part of May.

Marriage of the Palm

The two sexes are known to flower, though the flowers of the male or those of the female may be in the 'cuss' (vase) or a kind of pouch from which then the female's are also produced. They are the same as the male's but longer and thinner, and it is from the male pouch, by a tradition of the wise ancient Egyptians, that the hard-working Arab man–who obtains the biggest and best fruit–cuts the 'Dakar' (the male flower), splits it into various pieces, and puts one in the center of the 'Nitaie' (the female flower). He then ties it so it does not fall and so that the air, agitating them both, lets dust into the female flowers to fertilize them, creating a forced marriage instead of waiting for the random arrival of the season's winds, and this way one male can fertilize hundreds of females. The pollen of the male palm smells similar to its sperm, so the Arabs thought of it as an aphrodisiac and they would sometimes eat it. The female pollen was able to be fertilized by the male from a far distance because of a strong, fundamental attraction coming from the universe. As a result of this phenomenon, there would be fruit in Europe if this procedure was carried out.

Metamorphosis of the Palm

I was assured by many palm growers that they have seen a male plant become female, and have seen some become hermaphroditic; in Arabic, 'Hente' ,that is, 'half male and half female.'

Proliferation of the Palm

Both the males and females multiply substantially, and these POLOVI (offspring) always belong to the plant that created them. The father and its offspring, and the mother and its offspring, flower simultaneously; one always notices that the POLLOVI (of an offspring) leaves do not produce like those born from a kernel, rather, they are like the adult palm. Generally, the offspring of the female are transplanted and those of the male are destroyed. The palm is not receptive to all transplants because if any of its extremities are cut, it dies instantly.

A Coptic Tale

It is tradition for Coptic and Arabic farmers of palms that the male plant has a VISCICA (bladder) under its root, the same as that of animals known as 'Bedten' (two eggs), and by removing it, the male becomes female. I dug up the ground of various palms of different developmental stages and I found nothing. And if they were lost during the transplantation these trees would all be female, and if this were true, they would all extract the eggs of the male to make it female, given that one of them is enough to fertilize many. In the end, the (SPREUDICATI ?) of mid-Egypt would want a male palm, make it an immovable man, and others of the Basso, almost as though they were more moral, say 'Kalam battal di' and this and speaking badly, that is, wanting to say that it is not true; but everyone maintains that no one finds it.

Cultivation of the Palm

In some small, abandoned oases in the Arabic desert, I saw some palm groves which had all of their branches that nature had given them, and so they had a strange and awkward appearance. The cultivated palm has a thin, sturdy appearance and grows larger each year. The 'gerit' (branches) are cut, and the industrious Arab creates so many useful domestic objects out of them that there would be too many to list. Around the top of the trunk, the large parts of the cut branches are left in order to tether the heavy bunches. These branches, called 'Gahf', are cut the year after. They are either burned or made into 'magascia' (brooms). Under the 'gahf' there is 'eldiffa', a cinnamon-colored canvas that is beautifully outlined by nature, out of which various kinds of ropes are made. It is possible that this material gave primitive men the idea to weave and create the first articles of clothing; only one piece of this fabric is enough to cover oneself, which is something even barbarians did, as seen by the peoples at the first flood gates.

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Revision as of 20:50:45, 6 February 2022 by Pugliesa