AJ Cann
Today is a holiday (Thanksgiving) in the USA and most of our American readers will be taking a well earned day off in order to overeat and watch football (as opposed to soccer 😉 )
This afternoon as you slowly realize you should not have had the second slice of pumpkin pie, let AoB Blog try to ease your dyspepsia, or at least take your mind off it for a while, by encouraging you to read this fascinating article about the history of the pumpkin.
Happy thanksgiving!
Paris, H. S., Daunay, M. C., Pitrat, M., & Janick, J. (2006). First known image of Cucurbita in Europe, 1503–1508. Annals of Botany, 98(1), 41-47
The genus Cucurbita (pumpkin, squash, gourd) is native to the Americas and diffused to other continents subsequent to the European contact in 1492. For many years, the earliest images of this genus in Europe that were known to cucurbit specialists were the two illustrations of C. pepo pumpkins that were published in Fuchs’ De Historia Stirpium, 1542. Images of fruits of two Cucurbita species, drawn between 1515 and 1518, were recently discovered in the Villa Farnesina in Rome.
botanyone
Nigel Chaffey
Editor Pat Heslop-Harrison