Diospyros melanoxylon

Last updated

Coromandel ebony
Bark of Diospyros melanoxylon.jpg
Bark of the Coromandel ebony
Scientific classification OOjs UI icon edit-ltr.svg
Kingdom: Plantae
Clade: Tracheophytes
Clade: Angiosperms
Clade: Eudicots
Clade: Asterids
Order: Ericales
Family: Ebenaceae
Genus: Diospyros
Species:
D. melanoxylon
Binomial name
Diospyros melanoxylon
Synonyms [2]
  • Diospyros dubia Wall. ex A.DC.
  • Diospyros exsculpta Bedd.
  • Diospyros exsculpta Dalzell & Gibson
  • Diospyros montana B.Heyne ex A.DC.
  • Diospyros roylei Wall. ex A.DC.
  • Diospyros rubiginosa Roth
  • Diospyros tupru Buch.-Ham.
  • Diospyros wightiana Wall. nom. inval.

Diospyros melanoxylon, the Coromandel ebony or East Indian ebony, is a species of flowering tree in the family Ebenaceae native to India and Sri Lanka; it has a hard, dry bark. Its common name derives from Coromandel, the coast of southeastern India. Locally it is known as temburini or by its Hindi name tendu. In Odisha, Jharkhand, and Assam, it is known as kendu. In Andhra Pradesh, and Telangana it is known as tuniki. [3] The leaves can be wrapped around tobacco to create the Indian beedi , [4] which has outsold conventional cigarettes in India. [5] The olive-green fruit of the tree is edible. [6]

Contents


Pharmacology

Little Tendu Tree of Purulia, West Bengal, India Diospyros melanoxylon little Tree of Purulia, West Bengal, India.jpg
Little Tendu Tree of Purulia, West Bengal, India
Tendu patta (leaf) collection Diospyros melanoxylon Tendu.jpg
Tendu patta (leaf) collection

The leaf of the tree contains valuable flavones. [7] The pentacyclic triterpenes found in the leaves possess antimicrobial properties, [8] while the bark shows antihyperglycemic activity. [9] The bark of four Diospyros species found in India has been determined to have significant antiplasmodial effects against Plasmodium falciparum , which causes malaria in humans. [10]

Method of collection

Tendu leaves are used as a wrapper for beedi. During the summer, fresh leaves are produced by the suckers that emerge from the soil. This is also enhanced by lighting a fire beneath the Tendu tree. The fresh leaves are hand-picked by the tribals and dried in the sun for 10 days. This practice is seen in Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha and Chhattisgarh states of India. The State Government gives the license for collection and processing of the tendu leaves through tender every year. [11]

Culture and mythology

Tendu, also known as Tiril, and Kendu has cultural and mythological reference as well. According to the Munda people, during the ancient Sengael Deaah (an event of raining fire) their predecessors took shelter in the tree hollow of the Tiril tree. Tiril(tendu) tree is considered not easily flammable. A tree hollow in the tiril tree is a usual sight as the tribes strike the trunk with big stones in order to make the ripened fruit fall. This repeated striking over time makes a hole in the tree.

Due to the non-flammable nature of the tree, after the plantation of paddy, the tribes plant a branch of it in the field in order to protect the crop from any events of Sengael Deaah in the future. [12]

Tendu tree is also used in making hockey sticks by the adivasis of Jharkhand and Odisha. A young and straight branch of the tree is heated in fire and slowly shaped into the curves of a hockey stick.[ citation needed ]

Many villages have been named after the location and presence of the tree in the neighbourhood. These include Tiril Posi, Tiril, Tiril Haatu, Kenduda('Tendu' is also known as Kendu in the South Chotanagpur region) in Jharkhand and the Kendhujhar district in Odisha

Varieties

There is one named variety of this species, Diospyros melanoxylon var. tupru. [13]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ebenaceae</span> Family of flowering plants

The Ebenaceae are a family of flowering plants belonging to order Ericales. The family includes ebony and persimmon among about 768 species of trees and shrubs. It is distributed across the tropical and warmer temperate regions of the world. It is most diverse in the rainforests of Malesia, India, Thailand, tropical Africa and tropical America.

<i>Diospyros</i> Genus of trees and shrubs

Diospyros is a genus of over 700 species of deciduous and evergreen trees and shrubs. The majority are native to the tropics, with only a few species extending into temperate regions. Individual species valued for their hard, heavy, dark timber, are commonly known as ebony trees, while others are valued for their fruit and known as persimmon trees. Some are useful as ornamentals and many are of local ecological importance. Species of this genus are generally dioecious, with separate male and female plants.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Beedi</span> South Asian hand-made cigarette

A beedi is a thin cigarette or mini-cigar filled with tobacco flake and commonly wrapped in a tendu or Piliostigma racemosum leaf tied with a string or adhesive at one end. It originates from the Indian subcontinent. The name is derived from the Marwari word beeda—a mixture of betel nuts, herbs, and spices wrapped in a leaf. It is a traditional method of tobacco use throughout South Asia and parts of the Middle East, where beedies are popular and inexpensive. In India, beedi consumption outpaces conventional cigarettes, accounting for 48% of all Indian tobacco consumption in 2008.

<i>Hemidesmus indicus</i> Species of flowering plant

Hemidesmus indicus, Indian sarsaparilla, is a species of plant found in South Asia. It occurs over the greater part of India, from the upper Gangetic plain eastwards to Assam and in some places in central, western and South India.

<i>Mitragyna parvifolia</i> Species of tree

Mitragyna parvifolia is a tree species found in Asia, native to India and Sri Lanka. Mitragyna species are used medicinally and for their fine timber throughout the areas where they grow. M. parvifolia reaches heights of 50 feet with a branch spread over 15 feet. The stem is erect and branching. Flowers are yellow and grow in ball-shaped clusters. Leaves are a dark green in color, smooth, rounded in shape, and opposite in growth pattern.

Ambagarah Chowki is a town in the Chhattisgarh state of India. It is now a district in collaboration with Mohla and Manpur, naming the district Mohla-Manpur-Chowki.

<i>Diospyros blancoi</i> Species of persimmon

Diospyros blancoi,, commonly known as velvet apple, velvet persimmon, kamagong, or mabolo tree, is a tree of the genus Diospyros of ebony trees and persimmons. It produces edible fruit with a fine, velvety, reddish-brown fur-like covering. The fruit has a soft, creamy, pink flesh, with a taste and aroma comparable to peaches.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Flora of Saint Helena</span>

The flora of Saint Helena, an isolated island in the South Atlantic Ocean, is exceptional in its high level of endemism and the severe threats facing the survival of the flora. In phytogeography, it is in the phytochorion St. Helena and Ascension Region of the African Subkingdom, in the Paleotropical Kingdom.

<i>Senegalia mellifera</i> Species of legume

Senegalia mellifera is a common thorn tree in Africa. The name mellifera refers to its sweet-smelling blossoms and honey. Its lumber turns pitch black when oiled. Common names of the tree include Blackthorn and Swarthaak (Afrikaans). It is listed as being not threatened.

<i>Madhuca longifolia</i> Species of tree

Madhuca longifolia is an Indian tropical tree found largely in the central, southern, north Indian plains and forests, Nepal, Myanmar and Sri Lanka. It is commonly known as madhūka, mahura,madkam, mahuwa, Butter Tree,mahura, mahwa, mohulo, Iluppai, Mee or Ippa-chettu. It is a fast-growing tree that grows to approximately 20 meters in height, possesses evergreen or semi-evergreen foliage, and belongs to the family Sapotaceae. It is adaptable to arid environments, being a prominent tree in tropical mixed deciduous forests in India in the states of Maharashtra, Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Kerala, Gujarat, West Bengal and Tamil Nadu.

<i>Careya arborea</i> Species of tree

Careya arborea is a species of tree in the Lecythidaceae family, native to the Indian subcontinent, Afghanistan, and Indochina. Its common English names include wild guava, Ceylon oak, patana oak. Careya arborea is a deciduous tree that grows up to 15 metres (49 ft) high. Its leaves turn red in the cold season. Flowers are yellow or white in colour that become large green berries. The tree grows throughout India in forests and grasslands.

Pseudocercospora kaki is a fungal plant pathogen, who causes leaf spot of persimmon. It was originally found on leaves of Diospyros kaki in Taiwan. Some examples of other host species are Diospyros hispida, Diospyros lotus, Diospyros texana, and Diospyros melanoxylon.

<i>Xylia xylocarpa</i> Species of legume

Xylia xylocarpa is a species of tree in the mimosoid clade of the subfamily Caesalpinioideae of the family Fabaceae.

<i>Diospyros texana</i> Species of tree

Diospyros texana is a species of persimmon that is native to central, south and west Texas and southwest Oklahoma in the United States, and eastern Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León, and Tamaulipas in northeastern Mexico. Common names include Texas persimmon, Mexican persimmon and the more ambiguous "black persimmon". It is known in Spanish as chapote, chapote manzano, or chapote prieto, all of which are derived from the Nahuatl word tzapotl. That word also refers to several other fruit-bearing trees.

<i>Dendrophthoe falcata</i> Species of mistletoe

Dendrophthoe falcata is one of the hemiparasitic plants that belong to the mistletoe family Loranthaceae. It is the most common of all the mistletoes that occur in India. At the moment reports say that it has around 401 plant hosts. The genus Dendrophthoe comprises about 31 species spread across tropical Africa, Asia, and Australia among which 7 species are found in India.

<i>Diospyros malabarica</i> Species of flowering plant

Diospyros malabarica, the gaub tree, Malabar ebony, black-and-white ebony or pale moon ebony, is a species of flowering tree in the family Ebenaceae that is native to the Indian Subcontinent and South East Asia.

<i>Cassia javanica</i> Species of legume

Cassia javanica, also known as Java cassia, pink shower, apple blossom tree and rainbow shower tree, is a species of tree in the family Fabaceae. Its origin is in Southeast Asia, but it has been extensively grown in tropical areas worldwide as a garden tree owing to its beautiful crimson and pink flower bunches.

<i>Bauhinia racemosa</i> Species of legume

Bauhinia racemosa, commonly known as the bidi leaf tree, is a rare medicinal species of flowering shrub with religious significance. It is a small crooked tree with drooping branches that grows 3–5 metres (10–16 ft) tall and flowers between February and May. It is native to Southeast Asia, the Indian subcontinent and China.

<i>Diospyros ferrea</i> Species of flowering plant

Diospyros ferrea, known as black ebony, is a tree in the ebony family, distributed in Burma (Myanmar), Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Malay Peninsula, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Laos (Khammouan) and Taiwan.

<i>Casearia tomentosa</i> Species of flowering plant

Casearia tomentosa, commonly known as the toothed leaf chilla, is a species of flowering plant in the family Salicaceae, native to the Indian Subcontinent and Myanmar. It is one of 1,000 species that can be found in the Salicaeceae family.

References

  1. "Diospyros melanoxylon". Germplasm Resources Information Network . Agricultural Research Service, United States Department of Agriculture . Retrieved 9 April 2009.
  2. "The Plant List: A Working List of All Plant Species".
  3. http://harithaharam.telangana.gov.in/Silviculture%20of%20Species/Forest%20Seeds/045.htm
  4. Lal, Pranay (25 May 2009). "Bidi – A short history" (PDF). Current Science. 96 (10). Bangalore, India: Current Science Association: 1335–1337. Retrieved 5 May 2013.
  5. "...bidis command 48 percent of the market while chewing tobacco commands 38 percent and cigarettes 14 percent..." Archived 6 March 2012 at the Wayback Machine , "The Tax Treatment of Bidis", tobaccofreeunion.org
  6. "Diospyros melanoxylon - Useful Tropical Plants".
  7. NEW FLAVONOIDS FROM THE LEAVES OF DIOSPYROS MELANOXYLON, Uppuluri V. Mallavadhani and Anita Mahapatra
  8. Antimicrobial Activity of Some Pentacyclic Triterpenes and Their Synthesized 3-O-Lipophilic Chains, Uppuluri Venkata MALLAVADHANI,*, a Anita MAHAPATRA, a Kaiser JAMIL, b and Peddi Srinivasa REDDY, Biol. Pharm. Bull. 27(10) 1576—1579 (2004) Vol. 27, No. 10
  9. Antihyperglycemic effect of Diospyros melanoxylon (Roxb.) bark against Alloxan-induced diabetic rats Jadhav J. K*.Masirkar V. J., Deshmukh V. N.International Journal of PharmTech Research. CODEN( USA): IJPRIF ISSN   0974-4304, Vol.1, No.2, pp. 196–200, April–June 2009
  10. Investigation of Indian Diospyros Species for Antiplasmodial Properties, V. S. Satyanarayana Kantamreddi and Colin W. Wright. eCAM 2008;5(2)187–190
  11. "Working Plan of central Chanda forest division, Chandrapur" (PDF). mahaforest.nic.in. Archived from the original (PDF) on 30 August 2017. Retrieved 28 May 2018.
  12. "Clipping of Prabhat Khabar - RANCHI - City". epaper.prabhatkhabar.com. Retrieved 22 April 2022.
  13. "Diospyros melanoxylon Roxb. | Species".