Manchineel

Manchineel tree
250px
fruit and foliage
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Plantae
Division:	Magnoliophyta
Class:	Magnoliopsida
Order:	Malpighiales
Family:	Euphorbiaceae
Subfamily:	Euphorbioideae
Tribe:	Hippomaneae
Subtribe:	Hippomaninae
Genus:	Hippomane L.
Species:	H. mancinella
Binomial name
Hippomane mancinella L.
Synonyms
Mancanilla Mancinella and see text

The Manchineel tree (Hippomane mancinella) is a species of flowering plant in the spurge family (Euphorbiaceae), native to Florida in the United States, the Bahamas, the Caribbean, Central America, and northern South America. The name "manchineel" (sometimes written "manchioneel") as well as the specific epithet mancinella is from Spanish manzanilla ("little apple"), from the superficial resemblance of its fruit and leaves those of an apple tree. A present-day Spanish name is in fact manzanilla de la muerte, "little apple of death". This refers to the fact that manchineel is one of the most poisonous trees in the world.

Description

Manchineel is a tree reaching up to 15 meters high with a greyish bark, shiny green leaves and spikes of small greenish flowers. Its fruits, which are similar in appearance to an apple, are green or greenish-yellow when ripe.

The manchineel tree can be found near to (and on) coastal beaches. It provides excellent natural windbreaks and its roots stabilize the sand, thus helping to prevent beach erosion.

Taxonomy

Though numerous species have been named in the genus Hippomane, they are nowadays usually considered to be junior synonyms of a single polymorphic species. Synonyms include:

• Hippomane aucuparia
• Hippomane biglandulosa
• Hippomane cerifera
• Hippomane dioica
• Hippomane fruticosa
• Hippomane glandulosa
• Hippomane horrida
• Hippomane ilicifolia
• Hippomane mancanilla
• Hippomane spinosa
• Hippomane zeocca

Toxicity

The tree and its parts contain strong toxins. It will secrete a white milky substance during rainfall. Allegedly, standing beneath the tree during rain may cause blistering of the skin from mere contact with this liquid. Burning the tree may cause blindness if the smoke reaches the eyes. The fruit can also be fatal if eaten. Many trees carry a warning sign, while others are marked with a red "X" on the trunk to indicate danger.

The tree contains 12-deoxy-5-hydroxyphorbol-6gamma,7alpha-oxide, hippomanins, mancinellin, and sapogenin, phloracetophenone-2,4-dimethylether is present in the leaves, while the fruits possess physostigmine.

The Caribs used the sap of this tree to poison their arrows and would tie captives to the trunk of the tree, ensuring a slow and painful death. A poultice of arrowroot (Maranta arundinacea) was used by the Arawaks and Taíno as an antidote against such arrow poisons. The Caribs were known to poison the water supply of their enemies with the leaves. Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de León was struck by an arrow that had been poisoned with Manchineel sap during battle with the Calusa in Florida, dying shortly thereafter.

To Europeans, the manchineel quickly became notorious. The heroine of Giacomo Meyerbeer's 1865 opera L'Africaine commits suicide by lying under a manchineel tree and inhaling the plant's vapours. In the 1956 film Wind Across The Everglades, a notorious poacher named Cottonmouth (played by Burl Ives) ties a victim to the trunk of a manchineel tree. The poor soul screams as the sap burns his skin, and the next morning he is shown dead with a painful grimace etched on his face. To the audience the image of the deadly manchineel must have been familiar to some degree.

Conservation

The Manchineel tree is listed as an endangered species in Florida.

Literary and artistic references

John Esquemeling, author of the book The Buccaneers of America writes of his experience with the "tree called mancanilla, or dwarf-apple-tree" when in Hispianola (modern day Haiti/Dominican Republic).

One day being hugely tormented with mosquitoes or gnats, and as yet unacquainted with the nature of this tree, I cut a branch thereof, to serve me instead of a fan, but all my face swelled the next day and filled with blisters, as if it were burnt to such a degree that I was blind for three days.

Francis Barrett in The Magus (1801) writes "Hippomanes excites lust by the bare touch, or being suspended on the party."

Rafael Sabatini in The Chronicles of Captain Blood describes poisoning by manchineel fruit juice:

"Manzanilla!" Then he swung round, and, uttering horrible, blood-curdling blasphemies, he hurled the jack and the remainder of its contents at the dead man on the floor.

In Clive Cussler's 1988-published novel Treasure, manchineel is used to poison the crew and passengers of a special plane carrying UN Secretary General Hala Kamil to New York.

External links

de:Manchinelbaum tr:Manşinel