(atad ). Not our English trailing blackberries; but the Ρaliurus rhamnus aculeatus , a lowly stunted tree with drooping jagged branches, from which project sharp stiff thorns, affording no shade, but only scratching those who touched it; fit emblem of the self important, petty, but mischievous speaker (answering to Abimelech) in Jotham's parable (Judges 9:8-20), the oldest fable extant.
The "bramble bush" (Luke 6:44) is probably the same as Christ's thorn (Ζizyphus spina Christi ) supposed to be the kind of which Christ's crown of thorns was platted; a shrub about six feet high, producing an acid fruit as large as the sloe; the prickles grow in pairs, the one straight, the other curved back. The nebk of the Arabs, common everywhere, easily procurable, and pliable for platting, the leaves a deep green like the ivy; so suited to be a mock crown in imitation of the garlands or crowns with which emperors and generals used to be crowned.