VANILLA (U. S. P.)—VANILLA. History and Botanical Source

The plant which produces vanilla bean is an orchid, native of the tropical forests of Mexico, but now grown in many other parts of the globe, as in Brazil, Honduras, Java, Africa, and the West Indies, though only on the island of Guadaloupe on a commercial scale. Vanilla has probably been in use among the Mexicans from times immemorial, as a flavor to their chocolate, and was made known to the western world by the Spaniards. Hernandez, the Spanish historian, describes it under the botanical name Aracus aromaticus, also mentioning its Mexican name, Tlilxochitl. Clusius, in 1602, calls it Lobus oblongus aromaticus. The generic name of the plant was established, in 1752, by Plumier, and the present name of the species yielding the true Mexican vanilla of commerce, by Andrews, in 1808. (As to priority of synonyms, see George M. Beringer, Amer. Jour. Pharm., 1895, p. 611.) While the Index Kewensis enumerates 34 species of vanilla; only very few contribute to the world's supply of the vanillas of commerce—for example, V. planifolia, Andrews (Mexico, also cultivated in Réunion, Java, etc.); V. pompona, Schiede (southeast Mexico, Panama, Colombia, Venezuela, Surinam, Cayenne, Guadaloupe, etc.); and V. Gardneri, Rolfe (Brazil) (R. A. Rolfe, Kew Bulletin, 1895, p. 169; see Beringer, loc. cit.).