4167

5(2): Timber trees; Minor commercial timbers

Diospyros ebenum Koenig

This article should be read together with the article on the genus: Diospyros in the Handbook volume indicated above in this database.

Physiogr. Salsk. Handl. (Lund) 1: 176 (1781).

Diospyros glaberrima Rottb. (1783).

Ceylon ebony, Mauritius ebony (En).

Southern India and Sri Lanka; cultivated in Peninsular Malaysia.

Diospyros ebenum is said to produce the best commercial black ebony. It is mainly exported to China for furniture and to Europe as fancy wood.
The gummy astringent fruits are used as a medicine and eaten in times of famine. They are also used as fish poison, and the tree has been planted in India as a shade tree for cardamom.

A medium-sized tree up to 30 m tall, bole straight, up to 90 cm in diameter, with buttresses up to 2 m high, bark surface scaly, fissured, black to grey-black; leaves ovate-oblong to oblong-lanceolate, 5—13 cm 2—6 cm, base cuneate to rounded, apex slightly acuminate to rounded, glabrous, tertiary venation reticulate, inconspicuous above, prominent below; flowers mostly male and bisexual; male flowers in 3—16-flowered cymes, 4-merous, stamens 16; female and bisexual flowers solitary, 3—4-merous, calyx lobes valvate, glabrous, corolla divided to about halfway, staminodes 8, ovary with a single 4—5-lobed style and 8 uni-ovulate locules; fruit depressed globose to subglobose, up to 1.5 cm across, glabrous. Diospyros ebenum has been known for its black wood since ancient times. Its reported occurrence in Sulawesi and eastwards is erroneous. It occurs naturally in comparatively dry areas.

[42]Bakhuizen van den Brink, R.C., 1936–1955. Revisio Ebenacearum Malayensium. Contributions a l'Ttude de la flore des Indes NTerlandaises XXXIII. Bulletin du Jardin Botanique de Buitenzorg, STrie III, 15(1–5): 1–515, 92 plates.
[104]Corner, E.J.H., 1988. Wayside trees of Malaya. 3rd edition. 2 volumes. The Malayan Nature Society, Kuala Lumpur. 774 pp.
[120]Dassanayake, M.D. & Fosberg, F.R. (Editors), 1980–. A revised handbook to the flora of Ceylon. Amerind Publishing Co. Pvt. Ltd., New Delhi.
[204]Gottwald, H., 1984. Ebenhölzer und Persimmon [Ebony and persimmon]. Holz-Zentralblatt 110: 1025–1027.
[457]Ng, F.S.P., 1977. Notes on the systematy of Malayan phanerogams XXVI. Ebenaceae. Malaysian Forester 40: 210–248.
[586]Soerianegara, I., 1967. Beberapa keterangan tentang djenis-djenis pohon eboni Indonesia [Some notes on Indonesian ebony tree species]. Rimba Indonesia 12(2–4): 29–54.
[705]Whitmore, T.C. & Ng, F.S.P. (Editors), 1972–1989. Tree flora of Malaya. A manual for foresters. 2nd edition. 4 volumes. Malayan Forest Records No 26. Longman Malaysia SDN. Berhad, Kuala Lumpur & Petaling Jaya.

M.S.M. Sosef

Sosef, M.S.M., 1995. Diospyros ebenum Koenig. In: Lemmens, R.H.M.J., Soerianegara, I. and Wong, W.C. (Editors): Plant Resources of South-East Asia No 5(2): Timber trees; Minor commercial timbers. PROSEA Foundation, Bogor, Indonesia. Database record: prota4u.org/prosea