Clove

Dublin Core

Title

Clove

Subject

Clove is a spice derived from the dried, unopened flower buds of the evergreen tree Syzygium aromaticum.

Description

Clove is native to the Maluku Islands in eastern Indonesia. It was in use in China as early as the third century BCE, and has been used in India since ancient times. Between the second and eighth centuries CE, it was spread from Egypt throughout the Mediterranean region.

In 1514, the Portuguese gained control of the Maluku Islands and maintained a monopoly over the clove trade until the Dutch wrestled the islands from them about a century later. The Dutch restricted the cultivation of cloves to the single island of Amboina and the penalty for taking them elsewhere was death. The French sought to break the monopoly in the seventeenth century by securing plants in Mauritius and began to succeed towards the end of the eighteenth century. This practice led to clove plantations in Madagascar and Zanzibar (archipelago of present day Tanzania). Today, the main regions of clove cultivation remain Indonesia, Madagascar, and Tanzania.

Source

In Ms. Fr. 640:
Fol. 46r - "For the teeth, oil of sulfur"
Some people whiten them with confections of aquafortis; however, one says that this corrupts them afterward & causes a blackness on them. One says that oil of sulfur is excellent, but one needs to mix it in this way: take as much clove oil as can be held in a walnut shell, and as much rose honey, & seven or eight drops of oil of sulfur, & mix it well all together. And after having cleaned the teeth with a small burin, touch them lightly with a little cotton dipped in the aforesaid oils and leave it there for a little while, then spit or rinse your mouth with tepid water, and reiterate two or three times. Oil of sulfur penetrates & is corrosive, but the clove oil & the rose honey correct it. Therefore use it with discretion.
Fol. 47r - "For teeth"
Sal ammoniac i ℥, rock salt 1 ℥, alum half an ℥. Make water with the retort, and as soon as you touch the tooth, the tartar & blackness will go away. It is true that it has a bad odor, but you can mix it with rose honey & a little* cinnamon or clove oil.
Fol. 48r - "Excellent mustard"
Dry bread in an oven, then lard it with cloves & cinnamon & thus put it to soak in good wine. Then, pass everything through a tammy cloth, being well pestled, & incorporate it with your mustard seed.

Contributor

Alan Davison and Tom Jaine, eds., “Clove,” The Oxford Companion to Food (2 ed.), 2013, https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780192806819.001.0001/acref-9780192806819-e-0575?rskey=IG7C8D&result=4.

“Clove,” World Encyclopedia (Philip's, 2014), https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780199546091.001.0001/acref-9780199546091-e-2545?rskey=IG7C8D&result=6.

Image: Forem, “Clove Tree; The Philippine Islands; a Political, Geographical, Ethnographical, Social and Commercial History of the Philippine Archipelago, Embracing the Whole Period of Spanish Rule, with an Account of the Succeeding American Insular Government,” Artstor (Cornell University Library, 1700/1709), https://library.artstor.org/asset/CORNELL_ECHOLS_1039407373.

Elia Zhang, Columbia University

Files

CORNELL_ECHOLS_1039407373 (1).jpg

Citation

“Clove,” om+ka, accessed March 29, 2024, https://catapanoth.com/omandka/items/show/14.

Output Formats

Geolocation