Gladiolus
2 of the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Gladiolus. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
a genus of Iridaceae, with beautiful spikes of flowers, sword-shaped leaves and corms or bulbous rhizomes. They are propagated by offset corms or from seed; in this way innumerable hybrids have been produced. The hardy European forms are well adapted to the mixed border, wild garden or shrubbery in dry and sunny situations. Among the leading Cape forms are G. cardinalis (red), psittacinus (yellow with purple spots), floribundus (purple and white), etc., and these have given rise to numerous hybrids-e. g. the first two to G. gandavensis, which again stands at the head of series of hybrids and many new varieties. The scarlet G. brenchleyensis is similarly a standard form. The corm of G. communis was formerly officinal; and the Hottentots dig up some of the Cape species for the sake of their starchy corms.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
gla-di'o-lus (Latin, a little sword), a favorite garden flower allied to our blue flag. There are about 170 species, mostly from southern Africa. They are included in the general name of "Cape bulbs." The Hottentots are said to find as considerable an article of food in the bulbs which they collect as our Western Indians do in the camass bulb. As in the case of blue flag, the gladiolus has swordshaped leaves and a flower stalk crowded with showy, irregular flowers. After the flowering season it will be found that the plant has produced a new corm, which must be cared for in winter and reset in the spring. A number of small bulblets are formed about the main bulb. These may be used to advantage to produce new plants.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
The botany here still holds: Gladiolus remains a genus of Iridaceae with sword-shaped leaves and annually renewed corms, and modern counts put it at roughly 250 to 300 species, most of them southern African — close to the 170 Aiton's gave in 1910. What has moved is horticulture. The named standards of 1921, G. gandavensis and the scarlet brenchleyensis, have long since been absorbed into the large-flowered garden gladiolus (often listed as Gladiolus x grandiflorus or x hortulanus), which runs to many thousands of cultivars and became one of the world's staple cut flowers, grown commercially on a large scale in the Netherlands and elsewhere. Growers now also contend with pests the old accounts do not mention, above all gladiolus thrips and Fusarium corm rot. The word "Hottentots" in both entries is a colonial term now replaced by Khoikhoi; the peoples' use of wild corms as food is genuine, but the naming is not.
Written for this edition, 2026.