Hymenaea
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Hymenaea L. is a genus in the family Fabaceae (legume family) of fourteen living plant species. All but one of the living species are native to the tropics of the Americas, with one additional species (Hymenaea verrucosa) on the east coast of Africa. The genus is distributed through the Caribbean islands, and from southern Mexico to Brazil. In Colombia the trees are called algarrobo, and in Peru azúcar huayo. The Brazilian name is jatobá.
Most species of Hymenaea are large trees and they are primarily evergreen. They may grow to a height of 25 meters and emerge above the forest canopy. Some species will grow both as tall forest trees and as smaller shrubby trees depending on their surrounding habitat. The leaves are bifoliate, meaning that they have two leaflets attached to the petiole. The flowers grow in a panicle or corymb type of inflorescence.
Uses
The pulpy center of the fruits are edible, and the fruit is sold in local markets in the Americas. The leaves may be used to make a tea. The trees produce a dense wood used for timber in making ships and furniture. The thick bark of some species is used by indigenous people of the Amazon to make canoes.
The trees also make hard resins that are used to manufacture varnish, especially the resin from Hymenaea courbaril (jatobá) in Brazil. The resin that is produced in Brazil is known as South American copal, and Hymenaea verrucosa is the source of the valuable Zanzibar copal. Resin may be collected from living trees, or from the soil near the place where a tree once stood. Throughout its American range, indigenous peoples use the resin for incense and as a cement. Resin from the extinct species Hymenaea protera is the source of Dominican amber and probably of most amber found in the tropics.
See also
- Dominican amber
- Animé, an oleo-resin from Hymenaea species.
- Jatobá, the economically important Brazilian tree H. courbaril.
References
- Gentry, Alwyn H. (1996). A Field Guide to the Families and Genera of Woody Plants of Northwest South America (Colombia, Ecuador, Peru). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0-226-28944-3.
- Lee, Yin-Tse & Langenheim, Jean H. (1975). Sytematics of the Genus Hymenaea L. (Leguminosae, Caesalpinioideae, Detarieae). University of California Publications in Botany 69.
- Mabberley, D. J. (1987). The Plant Book: A Portable Dictionary of the Higher Plants. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-34060-8.
- Poinar, George Jr. & Brown, Alex E. (2002). Hymenaea mexicana sp. nov. (Leguminosae: Caesalpinioideae) from Mexican amber indicates Old World connections. Botanical J. of the Linnaean Soc. 139(2): 125.
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