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Fruits and leaves of Oriental plane
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| Platanus orientalis (Carolus Linnaeus) |
The Oriental plane (Platanus orientalis L.) is a very large, widespreading, and long-lived deciduous tree in the Platanaceae family. Its native range includes at least Eurasia from the Balkans to Iran. Some accounts extend its native range to Iberia in the west, and to the Himalaya in the east. As it has been known in cultivation from early times in much of this region, it can be difficult to establish if it is truly indigenous. It is often called Platane or related names in Europe, and Chenar or related names in Iran and India.
It is often found naturally in riverine settings, together with such trees as alder, willow and poplar. However, it is quite capable of survival and success in dry soils once it is established.
Like other Plane trees, its leaves are borne alternately on the stem, deeply lobed, and palmate or maple-like. It usually has flaking bark, occasionally not flaking and becoming thick and rugged. Flowers and fruit are round and burr like, borne in clusters of between 2 and 6 on a stem. Considerable variation exists among trees in the wild, and this may be complicated by crossbreeding with planted London planes (Platanus x hispanica), the hybrid of P. orientalis with American sycamore (Platanus occidentalis).
It is capable of being grown in most temperate latitudes, though it benefits greatly from warm summers.
The leaves and bark have been used medicinally. A fabric dye has been made from the twigs and roots.
The timber, often called lacewood, is figured and valuable for indoor furniture.
Myth and lore
From earliest days, the Oriental plane (P. orientalis) has been an outstanding tree in Persian gardens, which are built around water and shade. There it is known as the chinar, the plane tree to which Xerxes is said to have written an ode, to the astonishment of the Greeks. The moment is recorded in Handel's opera Xerxes in the famous Largo.
It is reputed to be the tree under which Hippocrates taught medicine at Kos. Pliny's Natural History records the westward progress of the plane "introduced among us from a foreign clime for nothing but its shade" (xii.3), planted first at the tomb of Diomedes on the island of Tremiti, then imported to Greek Sicily by Dionysius the Elder(c. 432-367 BC), tyrant of Syracuse, who had plane-trees conveyed to the city of Rhegium (Reggio di Calabria), where they were looked upon as the great marvel of his palace, according to Pliny's sources, and from there spread by the first century AD as far as the lands of the Morini in Belgic Gaul.