Tamarind

Tamarind (Tamarindus indica) is a leguminous tree (family Fabaceae) bearing edible fruit that is indigenous to tropical Africa. The genus Tamarindus is monotypic, meaning that it contains only this species.

Quotes

• The tamarind tree is very delectable to behold, being likewise very full of spreading branches, the leaves growing like to the box tree in England, but are shaped something more longer, and not of that hardness with the forementioned, but more pliable. It shooteth out a white flower, which hath no grateful flavour, which falling off, produces its fruit in shape of a peascod, being filled with a row of stones, covered with a brittle shell, which incloseth the pulp, being of a pleasant acid quality, and is a good commodity in Europe.
  • John Burnell, Quoted in Jain, Meenakshi (2011). The India they saw: Foreign accounts. Volume IV.

• In the garden of the said Capuchins I saw for the first time on a tree a fruit which tickled my curiosity so much that I must describe it. It is called Giacca, or Taqua, as the Portuguese write it. The tree was of the size of a moderate oak and the fruit is of the size of a bag of middling size, about four palms long and proportionately thick, viz., a little than two palms in diameter; and because, if this fruit were to grow on the branches like other fruits, the branches would certainly not be able to bear its weight, Nature has wisely ordained that it should grow on the trunk....
  • Father Matteo Ripa. Quoted in Jain, Meenakshi (2011). The India they saw: Foreign accounts. Volume IV. Also in Nair, P. Thankappan, Calcutta In The 19th Century, Firma KLM Private Ltd., 1989. 32 ff

• …the Tamarind tree, which grows there, is so famous among the English that, when they return to London and speak of what they have seen, they make a special mention of the Tamarind tree of Golicatan [Calcutta].
  • Father Matteo Ripa. Quoted in Jain, Meenakshi (2011). The India they saw: Foreign accounts. Volume IV.