Banana fruit: Journey from South East Asian to North America

Portuguese sailors brought bananas to Europe from West Africa in the early fifteenth century. Portuguese called it by its Arab name of al-vaneyra. The islanders of Sao Tome called the fruit abana. Its Guinean name banema, which became banana in English, was first found in print in the seventeenth century.

The original banana has been cultivated and used since ancient times, even pre-dating the cultivation of rice. The wild ancestor of edible bananas (M. acuminata Colla and M. balbisiana Colla), except for the fe’i bananas, are centered in Malesia, a term that refers to the entire region from Thailand to New Guinea roughly the main trading are of the Malay mariners.

Bananas may initially have been introduced into Africa by Arab traders who brought the plants from Malaysia. By the fourteenth century banana had colonized the whole of Africa. An Arab traveler mentions it as existing in the south of Morocco.

The banana was carried by sailors to the Canary Islands and the West Indies, finally making it to North America with Spanish missionary Friar Tomas de Berlanga is believed to have been the first to bring bananas plants to the New World.

Friar Tomas de Berlanga set up the first New World banana plantation in 1516. Banana plantation were soon established throughout European colonies in the Caribbean as well as in South and Central America.

The yellow sweet banana, much different than its starchy cousin the plantain was discovered in 1836 in Jamaica Jean Francois Poujot, who found one of the banana trees on his plantation was bearing yellow fruit rather than green or red. Upon tasting the new discovery, he found it to be sweet in its raw state, without the need for cooking. He quickly began cultivating this sweet variety.

The sweet banana quickly made its way around the fledging colonies and onto Europe, where it was used extensively in baked goods and desserts. Soon they were being imported from the Caribbean to New Orleans, Boston, and New York, and were considered such an exotic treat, they were eaten on a plate using a knife and fork.

In the United Sates, the banana was initially regarded as a luxury fruit and a foreign one at that. Bananas began appearing in New Orleans markets during the 1830s and 1840s. Sweet bananas were all the rage at the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Exposition, selling for a hefty ten cents each.
Banana fruit: Journey from South East Asian to North America

Friar Tomas de Berlanga and banana

One of the first records of bananas dates back to Alexander the Great’s conquest of India where he first discovered bananas in 327 BC. During the 1500's, as Spanish Explorers began to visit the New World, the banana traveled with them.

According the Spanish history, Friar Tomas de Berlanga brought the first banana root stocks from a Portuguese settlement in the Canary Islands, to the Spanish colony of Santo Domingo, or present-day Dominican Republic.

In 1516, De Berlanga set up the first New World banana plantation in the rich, fertile soil of the tropics, thus beginning the banana’s future in American life. Banana plantations were soon established throughout European colonies in the Caribbean, as well as in South and Central America.

Export trading in bananas started with small shipments from Caribbean to the United States of America early in the nineteenth century; these consisted of bunches, probably Gros Michael, transported in unrefrigerated space on schooners.

But the early twentieth century shipbuilders had built refrigerated ships. They painted them white to reflect the hot tropical sun.
Friar Tomas de Berlanga and banana

Banana in India

Banana plants were cultivated in India from early times. Religious rituals and Sastric tradition describe it as highly auspicious plant, particularly for marriage ceremonies. The leaves and fruits are deposited on doorstep of houses where marriages are taking place.

Banana fruit is considered to be a symbol of fertility and good luck. Its plant is associated with Vishnu and Lakshmi. According to one tradition, the banana is the incarnation of Lakhsmi, the goddess of wealth, beauty and wisdom.

Banana is also the subject of Hindu art. On the Vedic tradition, a banana grove is home to the monkey god Hanuman.

Descriptions of bananas are given in Greek writings on 327 BC in Indus Valley, during the expedition of Alexander the Great in India.

Most botanists believe that bananas were introduced from India to the Middle East and across North American by Arabs. Arabian traders introduced the banana plant into Africa a very early date, perhaps in the seventh century AD. The Portuguese along with the Spanish were instrumental in the worldwide spread of bananas and plantains especially to America.
Banana in India

The origin of banana

The original banana has been cultivated and used since ancient times, even pre-dating the cultivation of rice.

The earliest reference to banana dates back to about 500 BC. Some horticulturists suspect that banana was the earth’s first fruit.

Nevertheless, the origin of bananas is traced back to Southeast Asia in the jungles of Malaysia, Indonesia or Philippines.

Bananas may have been taken from this area across the Indian Ocean to Madagascar about AD 500 and therefore into East Africa, Zaire and West Africa.

Musa accuminata is a native of the Malay Peninsula and adjacent regions whole Musa balbisiana is found in India eastwards to the tropical Pacific.

Both bananas and plantains were known on the west coast of Africa in the 14-15th century when the Portuguese arrived.

In 1000 AD, banana was distributed throughout Polynesia and introduction to Mediterranean areas during Arab expansion.

The first scientific term given to banana is Musa paradisiaca Linn., published in 1753 by Linnaeus in his book Species Plantarum, the origin of modern botanical nomenclature.

The name Musa adopted by Linnaeus for the entire genius may have been derived from Antonius Musa (63-14 BC) who was physician to the first Roman Emperor, Octavius Augustus.
The origin of banana

Early history of banana production in Latin America

Although small scale banana production has existed in Latin America such the sixteenth century and banana were first exported to foreign markets in the nineteenth, the last hundred years have been the century for bananas in many parts of Latin America.

Bananas were produced entirely by small peasant farmers up to the 1880s. By 1880s, however, large scale banana production had begun.

Initially this was nor undertaken by the traditional planters but throughout the Americas, the introduction of commercial banana cultivation involved daunting tasks from entrepreneurs, engineers and workers of the late nineteenth century.

The history of bananas in Latin America is tightly intertwined with the history of the United Fruit Company, The United fruit Company, which was incorporated in 1899, owned or leased 3.5 million acres in Guatemala, Honduras, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Panama,, Cuba, Jamaica, the Dominion Republic, Colombia and Ecuador.

Ecuador entered the banana trade in 1910. The country did not become a significant exporter of bananas in the world market, however until after World War II when Ecuador turned to bananas to fill the void left by the 1920 collapse of its cacao industry.

The rise of bananas as an export crop also ended Guatemala dependency on coffee.

Honduras was the first Latin American country to be known as a banana republic due to the more than 60% share of bananas in Honduras exports and the increasingly influential role of the banana companies at the beginning of the 20th century.

Honduras was the leading exporters of bananas between the 1870s and 1970s, has been considered by many observers to be banana republic par excellence.

Innovations during the 1970s, for example the substitution of Gros Michel by Cavendish varieties, the boxing of bananas and overhead cableways for fruit transport, resulted in lowering production costs, an expansion in production and decreasing world prices.
Early history of banana production in Latin America

Banana during ancient times

Bananas are considered to be one of the earliest fruit cultivated by man. It is an ancient fruit that mentioned in various sacred texts of Oriental peoples.

In ancient times, the eating of fruit may well have been thought to induce sexual desire in both men and women.

The oldest reference to banana appears in the Ramayana (Sanskrit epic written by Valmiki in 2029 BC).

Armies of Alexander the Great also mentioned about the cultivation banana in the lower Hindus valley of India in 327 BC.

The Borobudur temple which was built in Java, Indonesia in 850 BC, shows stone carvings of banana being offered to the Lord Buddha.

Banana seems to have reached Africa by the first century CE and it arrived in southern China by about 200 CE.

During the same period it was taken eastward though the Pacific Islands, and the Arabs spread its cultivation throughout their lands as far north as Egypt.

During fourteenth century Arab traveler mentions the banana existing in the south of Morocco. In the fifteenth century the Portuguese called its Arab name of ‘al-vaneya’.

The islanders of Sao Tome celled the fruit ‘abana’ and Pigafetta mention seeing it in the Congo at the end of the sixteenth century, where it has long been grown.

Banana reached the New World in 1516 and its cultivation is distributed throughout the warmer countries situated in the region between 30 N and 30 S of the equator.
Banana during ancient times

History of Banana

Food History
Bananas are the fruit of Musa acuminata. Acuminata means long-pointed or tapering, not referring to the fruit, but to the flowers giving birth to the fruit.

Antonius Musa was the personal physician to Roman emperor Octavius Augustus, and it was he who was credited for promoting cultivation of the exotic African fruit from 63 to 14 B.C.

Portugese sailors brought bananas to Europe from West Africa in the early fifteenth century. Its Guinean name banema, which became banana in English, was first found in print in the seventeenth century.

The original banana has been cultivated and used since ancient times, even pre-dating the cultivation of rice. While the banana thrived in Africa, its origins are said to be of East Asia and Oceania.

The banana was carried by sailors to the Canary Islands and the West Indies, finally making it to North America with Spanish missionary Friar Tomas de Berlanga. These historical bananas were not the sweet yellow banana we know today, but the red and green cooking variety, now usually referred to as plantains to distinguish them from the sweet type.

The yellow sweet banana is a mutant strain of the cooking banana, discovered in 1836 by Jamaican Jean Francois Poujot, who found one of the banana trees on his plantation was bearing yellow fruit rather than green or red. Upon tasting the new discovery, he found it to be sweet in its raw state, without the need for cooking. He quickly began cultivating this sweet variety.

Soon they were being imported from the Caribbean to New Orleans, Boston, and New York, and were considered such an exotic treat, they were eaten on a plate using a knife and fork. Sweet bananas were all the rage at the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Exposition, selling for a hefty ten cents each.
Food History