Curiosities – Spurce

The spruce ( Picea spp. ) owes its name to the Latin word “piceus” = fish, black as pitch, and in turn the Greek “piss” = pitch, resin, a term that resulted in another Latino with which the Romans called a pitch or pitch pine as “pix” and pine which was obtained. According to Pliny the spruce was the main source of fish (resin) in antiquity.

As we said at the beginning, not the same one fir ( Abies ) a spruce ( Picea ), but the popular confusion between fir and spruce increased further when Linnaeus considered the silver fir and spruce spruce common or as species pine genus Pinus and erroneously called silver fir spruce pine and spruce Pinus abies , why now, and once corrected the error of classification, the common spruce or red spruce is called as Picea abies .

“Abies” was the Latin name and fir wood (in Vulgar Latin, abetum ), which in turn came from the Greek “Abin” , while others relate it to the Greek “abios” = long life. It is possible that the Greek root of Indo-appropriate “ab” = water or liquid, referring, perhaps, the resinous liquid that flowed from his wounds.

Even today, the confusion is such that:

common spruce, spruce or Norway spruce (Picea abies (L.) Karst. ) sold as a Christmas tree is a fir tree thinking.

even in the book “Trees of singular Madrid”, though they make the clarification of the difference between the gender of the fir ( Abies ) and other genres, surprising that the index does not include a specific chapter for spruce, following botanical criteria, and including in the chapter of the firs, according to popular approach. Specifically they do with a Himalayan spruce (Picea Smithian (Wall.E) Boiss. = Pinus Smithian Wall. ) and a common spruce or red spruce (Picea abies (L.) H. Karst.) are included in the chapter on firs.

The common spruce or red spruce (Picea abies (L.) H. Karst.) has many legends in Europe and in ancient times was considered in many places as a symbol of eternal life, believing that the devil fled from this tree, so it is possible to find many people together to their churches.

Its wood is of excellent quality, even better than the fir ( Abies ), and is used in pulp manufacture, shipbuilding, paddles, propeller airplanes, carpentry, joinery, construction formwork and sounding boards for musical instruments string instruments (pianos, violins, etc..), for example, for the manufacture of the famous Stradivarius violins. This is because at the highest altitudes of the mountains some spruce trees grow very slowly, only 2 or 3 cm. every 10 years!, resulting in the “wood resonance,” which is a wood that is very close rings with a very fine grain, due to its slow growth.

Before the invention of the manufacture of chewing gum or chewing gum, some spruce, red spruce as ( Picea rubens ) was obtained a resin called “spruce gum” that was consumed for chewing and medicinal properties were attributed.

In Madrid, Murillo Square, between the entrance to the Botanical Garden and one of the entrances to the Prado Museum, there is a copy of the Himalayan spruce (Picea Smithian (Wall.E) Boiss. = Pinus Smithian Wall. ) , also called Afghanistan spruce spruce Smith, from one of the first plantations of the late eighteenth century, with 22 meters high, 3.80 meters at the trunk base, 9.5 m crown diameter and 200 years of old.