| Title | Hurts |
| Caption | Currants |
| Source | Britton, N.L., and A. Brown. 1913. An illustrated flora of the northern United States, Canada and the British Possessions. 3 vols. Charles Scribner's Sons, New York. Vol. 2: 698. |
| Date | 1913 |
| URL | http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=VAAR&photoID=baar2_001_avd.tif |
| Creator | NL Britton and A Brown |
| Type | Drawing |
| Copyright | 1913 |
| Origin | Internet |
| Notes | Lawson p.112 describes winter currants as a “very pretty, bushy Tree, about seven or eight Foot high, very spreading, which bears a Winter-Fruit, that is ripe in October. They call’ em Currants, but they are nearer a Hurt. . . . They dry them instead of Currants.” Lawson also describes Bermudas Currants that grow in the woods on a bush . . . much like a European Currant. Lawson has eaten them but regards them as “a very indifferent Fruit.” He also describes April Currants that grow on the banks of rivers, has red fruit, on a tree. Bellis Winter currant may be sparkleberry (Vaccinium arboreum Marshall). Redford describes this species as “shrub or small tree to 10 m tall, berry black, dry and mealy, long persistent, fruit in Sept./Oct. I am not sure what plants Lawson described as Bermudas currants and April currants. ; Bellis ‘Hurts’ is an English term for berries produced by plants belonging to the Heath Family (Ericaceae). These include blueberries, huckleberries. |
Hurts / hurtleberries – These terms occurs on pg. 756 with other fruits which Hariot found that the New World had in common with England. The OED tentatively equates these two terms, as does Hariot. In both cases, the OED also equates these with both “whortleberries” and “huckleberries” – thus it seems as if hurtleberries, whortleberries, and huckleberries are, linguistically and taxonomically, all the same berry. - Matt