The genus Ensete was first described by Paul Fedorowitsch Horaninow (or Horaninov, 1796–1865) in his Prodromus Monographiae Scitaminarum of 1862 in which he created a single species, Ensete edule. However, the genus did not receive general recognition until 1947 when it was revived by E. E. Cheesman in the first of a series of papers in the Kew Bulletin on the classification of the bananas, with a total of 25 species.[4]
Taxonomically, the genus Ensete has shrunk since Cheesman revived the taxon. Cheesman acknowledged that field study might reveal synonymy and the most recent review of the genus by Simmonds (1960) listed just six. Recently the number has increased to seven as the Flora of China has, not entirely convincingly, reinstated Ensete wilsonii. There is one species in Thailand, somewhat resembling E. superbum, that has not been formally described, and possibly other Asian species.[citation needed]
It is possible to separate Ensete into its African and Asian species.
Borrell, James S., Mark Goodwin, Guy Blomme, Kim Jacobsen, Abebe M. Wendawek, Dawd Gashu, Ermias Lulekal, Zemede Asfaw, Sebsebe Demissew, and Paul Wilkin. "Enset‐based agricultural systems in Ethiopia: A systematic review of production trends, agronomy, processing and the wider food security applications of a neglected banana relative." Plants, People, Planet 2, no. 3 (2020): 212-228.
External links
Look up ensete in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
A banana is an elongated, edible fruit – botanically a berry – produced by several kinds of large treelike herbaceous flowering plants in the genus Musa. In some countries, cooking bananas are called plantains, distinguishing them from dessert bananas. The fruit is variable in size, color and firmness, but is usually elongated and curved, with soft flesh rich in starch covered with a peel, which may have a variety of colors when ripe. It grows upward in clusters near the top of the plant. Almost all modern edible seedless (parthenocarp) cultivated bananas come from two wild species – Musa acuminata and Musa balbisiana, or hybrids of them.
Musaceae is a family of flowering plants composed of three genera with about 91 known species, placed in the order Zingiberales. The family is native to the tropics of Africa and Asia. The plants have a large herbaceous growth habit with leaves with overlapping basal sheaths that form a pseudostem making some members appear to be woody trees. In most treatments, the family has three genera, Musa, Musella and Ensete. Cultivated bananas are commercially important members of the family, and many others are grown as ornamental plants.
Cibotium, also known as manfern, is a genus of 11 species of tropical tree ferns. It is the only genus in family Cibotiaceae in the Pteridophyte Phylogeny Group classification of 2016. Alternatively, the family may be treated as the subfamily Cibotioideae of a very broadly defined family Cyatheaceae, the family placement used for the genus in Plants of the World Online as of November 2019.
Banana is the common name for flowering plants of the genus Musa and for the fruit they produce.
Musa is one of three genera in the family Musaceae. The genus includes 83 species of flowering plants producing edible bananas and plantains, and fiber (abacá), used to make paper and cloth. Though they grow as high as trees, banana and plantain plants are not woody and their apparent "stem" is made up of the bases of the huge leaf stalks. Thus, they are technically gigantic herbaceous plants.
Musella lasiocarpa, commonly known as Chinese dwarf banana, golden lotus banana or Chinese yellow banana, is the sole species in the genus Musella. It is thus a close relative of bananas, and also a member of the family Musaceae.
Musa basjoo, known variously as Japanese banana, Japanese fibre banana or hardy banana, is a species of flowering plant belonging to the banana family Musaceae. It was previously thought to have originated in the Ryukyu Islands of southern Japan, from where it was first described in cultivation, but is now known to have originated in subtropical southern China, where it is also widely cultivated, with wild populations found in Sichuan province. Its specific name is derived from its Japanese common name, bashō (芭蕉).
Ensete superbum is a species of banana from India.
Ensete ventricosum, commonly known as enset or ensete, Ethiopian banana, Abyssinian banana, pseudo-banana, false banana and wild banana, is a species of flowering plant in the banana family Musaceae. The domesticated form of the plant is cultivated only in Ethiopia, where it provides the staple food for approximately 20 million people. The name Ensete ventricosum was first published in the Kew Bulletin 1947, p. 101. Its synonyms include Musa arnoldiana De Wild., Musa ventricosa Welw. and Musa ensete J. F. Gmelin. In its wild form, it is native to the eastern edge of the Great African Plateau, extending northwards from South Africa through Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania to Ethiopia, and west to the Congo, being found in high-rainfall forests on mountains, and along forested ravines and streams.
Musa itinerans, the Yunnan banana, is a species of banana found in continental Southeast Asia from Northeast India to Vietnam. The tender inner stalk is also harvested and eaten. It is the landmark 24,200th plant species saved at Kew Gardens' Millennium Seed Bank Project. With this addition, the seed bank had collected 10% of the world’s wild plant species. In China it is an important food for wild Asian elephants.
Musa × alinsanaya is a Malesian tropical plant in the banana family (Musaceae), native to the Philippines. Only formally named in 2004, it is considered to be a hybrid between Musa banksii and Musa textilis. The flower bud is shiny green with purple inside. It produces small fruit with a high proportion of seeds.
Banana Xanthomonas Wilt (BXW), or banana bacterial wilt (BBW) or enset wilt is a bacterial disease caused by Xanthomonas vasicola pv. musacearum. After being originally identified on a close relative of banana, Ensete ventricosum, in Ethiopia in the 1960s, BXW emanated in Uganda in 2001 affecting all types of banana cultivars. Since then BXW has been diagnosed in Central and East Africa including banana growing regions of: Rwanda, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Tanzania, Kenya, Burundi, and Uganda.
Ensete glaucum, the snow banana, has also been classified as Musa nepalensis, Ensete giganteum, or Ensete wilsonii.
Ernest Entwistle Cheesman, was an English botanist noted for his work on the family Musaceae. He was the son of Charles Cheesman and Grace Lizzie Davies. About August 1936 he married Ellen Elizabeth B. Weston (1892-1966).
Musa borneensis is a species of wild banana, native to the island of Borneo, in the Malaysian states of Sabah and Sarawak. It is placed in section Callimusa, having a diploid chromosome number of 2n = 20.
Musa banksii is a species of wild banana, native to New Guinea and Australia (Queensland), and most likely introduced to Samoa. It was first described by Ferdinand von Mueller in 1863 from plants collected in Queensland, Australia. Thereafter, taxonomists have variously treated it as a unique species or as a subspecies of Musa acuminata. The first one to note an affinity with Musa acuminata was Ernest E. Cheesman in 1948. In 1957, Norman Simmonds reclassified it as a subspecies of Musa acuminata based on extensive field observations in New Guinea, Australia, and Samoa. In 1976, George Argent chose to treat it as a species.
Sebsebe Demissew is an Ethiopian botanist who is Professor of Plant Systematics and Biodiversity at Addis Ababa University and Executive Director of the Gullele Botanic Garden in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Kocho is a bread-like fermented food made from chopped and grated ensete pulp. The pseudo-stem of the ensete plant contains a pith that is collected, pulped, and mixed with yeast before being fermented for three months to two years. It is used as a staple in Ethiopian cuisine in place of or alongside injera. In 1975 more than one-sixth of Ethiopians depended completely or partially on kocho for a substantial part of their food. It is eaten with foods such as kitfo, gomen, and ayibe (cheese). The stem is pounded to extract the pulp, which is then fermented for several weeks before being cooked. Kocho is often served with stews and is a staple food in some parts of Ethiopia. It has a sour taste and a dense, dough-like texture. It is made from the scraped leaf sheath fibre and pulverised corm of the enset plant. Kocho can be stored underground from three months to twelve months, making it a ready source of nutrition during periods of food scarcity. Kocho is typically used as a utensil to scoop up other foods.
The Madagascar banana or Ensete perrieri is a species of banana exclusively found in western Madagascar. The Madagascar banana is listed as critically endangered because of deforestation and climate change. However, some botanists believe that the Madagascar banana is a potential source of resistance to Panama disease, which wiped out the Gros Michel banana, and threatens the Cavendish banana, which is the main banana of international commerce.
Inga Hedberg was a Swedish botanist and academic. She was an expert on African alpine plants and was a leading member of the Ethiopian Flora Project that compiled an eight volume Flora, Flora of Ethiopia and Eritrea, which was published between 1989 and 2009.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
