The Natural History of Pliny, Volume 4 (of 6)

For the remaining plants a brief description will suffice. The best time for sowing ocimum,1163 it is said, is at the festival of the Parilia;1164 though some say that it may be done in autumn as well, and recommend, when it is sown in winter, to drench the seed thoroughly with vinegar. Rocket,1165 too, and nasturtium1166 may be grown with the greatest facility either in summer or winter. Rocket, more particularly, is able to stand the cold, and its properties are quite different from those of the lettuce, as it is a great provocative of lust. Hence it is that we are in the habit of mixing these two plants in our dishes, the excess of cold in the one being compensated by the equal degree of heat in the other. Nasturtium has received that name from1167 the smarting sensation which its pungency causes to the nostrils, and hence it is that a certain notion of smartness has attached itself to the word, it having become quite a proverbial saying, that a sluggish man should eat nasturtium, to arouse him from his torpidity. In Arabia, it is said, this plant attains a size that is quite marvellous.