The word nana (perfumed), part of the native name retained in French and German ananas, is a Brazilian Guarani vocable.
Taxonomical work on genus Ananas was probably initiated during the 16th century when Charles Plumier, a Jesuit priest collected pineapple plants on the island of Hispaniola.
Pineapple were brought to Europe to give the Old World, a taste of their succulence, but the Emperor Charles V, the first monarch to try one, thought it very nasty.
The first successfully greenhouse cultivation was by Le Cour at the end of the 17th century near Leiden.
Spanish and Portuguese explorers then distributed the fruit to India, Philippines, Malaysia and Africa in the 16th and 17th centuries.
By 1594 it reached China and by 1655, South Africa.
The first commercial plantation was established on Hawaii in 1885, and Hawaii remained the major producer until the 1960s.
Pineapple was canned for the forts time in 1888 in Malaysia and canned pineapple was exported for the forts time from Singapore to Europe around 1900.
History of Ananas comosus
