Roxburgh's Trees of India: Plum Mango
Scottish botanist William Roxburgh spent over 30 years in India documenting Indian plants. This is the story of one plant, the plum mango
Plant specimen by Charles Turner WarrenBRIT Collections
William Roxburgh (1751-1815)
The watercolor illustration in this story was created by a local Indian artist in Calcutta. Scottish botanist William Roxburgh (seen here) commissioned such drawings on behalf of the East India Company.
Plant specimen (ca. 1812 - 1814, Calcutta) by Unknown Artist commissioned by William RoxburghBRIT Collections
“Company School” is a broad term used by art historians to describe a variety of hybrid Indo-European style of paintings that developed in India in the 18th and 19th centuries by Indian artists under the patronage of various East India Companies.
Most Company paintings were described as small and intimate, reflecting the Indian miniature tradition, although natural history paintings of plants and flora were usually life-size.
Plum Mango
The opening artwork in this story depicts Bouea oppositifolia, a tree in the Sumac or Cashew family (Anacardiaceae). The family is medium-sized, with approximately 1000 species concentrated in the tropics and subtropics but also with some in temperate areas.
Anacardiaceae, the Cashew and Sumac family of plants
This plant family is economically important as it includes food plant trees such as, cashew (Anacardium occidentale), mango (Mangifera indica), and pistachio (Pistacia vera).
Plant specimen by UnspecifiedBRIT Collections
Plum Mango relatives: The Cashew Tree
The cashew tree, Anacardium occidentale, originated in the new world tropics, but is now cultivated around the world.
Mangifera indica (common name Mangoso) specimen from Dominica by UnspecifiedBRIT Collections
Plum Mango Relatives: the Mango Tree
The Mango tree, Mangifera indica, is a showy tree with edible fruit and dark green foliage that is cultivated in tropical areas. It is thought to have originated in India.
A mango...by any other name?
When Roxburgh published the Plum Mango as a new species in 1814, he classified it with the true mangoes, as Mangifera oppositifolia in Hortus Benghalensis, or a Catalogue of Plants Growing in the Honourable East India Company's Botanical Garden at Calcutta. Serampore). However...
23 years later...
In 1837, Swiss botanist Carl Friedrich Meisner reclassified and renamed the species under the genus Bouea (Plantarum Vascularum Genera).
Simply, this means that this small tree was not really a species of mango but rather a species of the closely related genus, Bouea, in the same family.
The genus name, Bouea, commemorates the Ami Boue (d.1881), the botanist and geologist that co-founded the Geological Society of France. The specific epithet, oppositifolia, aptly describes the way the leaves emerge from the stems opposite one another.
The common name, Plum Mango, which it shares with a closely related species, Bouea macrophylla, alludes to the edible fruits for which it is cultivated, which resemble small mangoes.
Plant specimen (ca. 1812 - 1814, Calcutta) by Unknown Artist commissioned by William RoxburghBRIT Collections
Plum Mango Tree
In India, Bouea oppositifolia is called miriam, mayan, mai-een, uriam.
Miriam is described as a handsome medium-sized tree, up to 10 meters in height and 1 meter in girth. It is distributed in the Sundarbans and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands (Wealth of India, 1985-95).
Plum Mango Wood
The wood is grey, hard and with dark reddish-brown heart-wood. It is considered durable (and heavy, 55 lbs per ft³ / 881 kg/m³) and is used in Sundarbans for parts of boats above water line (Wealth of India, 1985-95; A Dictionary of Economic Products of India, Watt 1972).
Flowers
The flowers are small, greenish-yellow-white blooms that are borne in terminal clusters.
Story created by Barney Lipscomb and Tiana Rehman, Botanical Research Institute of Texas and Fort Worth Botanic Garden, with the help of BRIT Library & Special Collections.
References:
Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (India). (1985). The Wealth of India: A dictionary of Indian raw materials & industrial products. New Delhi: Publications & Information Directorate, Council of Scientific & Industrial Research.
Meissner, C. F. (1836). Plantarum vascularum genera: Secundum ordines naturales digesta. Lipsiae: Libraria Weidmannia.
Roxburgh, W. (1814). Hortus Bengalensis, or a catalogue of the plants growing in the honourable East India Company's Botanic Garden at Calcutta. Serampore: Mission Press.
Watt, G., Thurston, E., & Mukhopādhyāẏa, T. (1972). A dictionary of the economic products of India. Delhi: Cosmo Publications.
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