Entry Detail


persimmon tree


Entry Type:  
Species
Scientific Name:  
Common Name:  
persimmon tree
Myaamia Name:  
pyaakimišaahkwi
Harvest Seasons:  
Winter
Habitats:  
Beech-Maple Forest, Wet Prairie grasslands with flooding, Conifer Shrubland and Forest, Conifer Swamp some deciduous domts.

Media 
Media not available.
Myaamia Archival Sources  
Reference Source Reference Type Archival Data Comments
Gonella, M.P 2003-2006 Use - Food

Persimmon pudding (24 servings (one 9x13 pan). Beat: 2 eggs. Add: 1 1/2 cups sugar, 2 cups persimmon pulp. Sift: 1 ¾ cup flour, 2 tsp. baking powder, 1 tsp cinnamon. Combine in separate bowl: 1 cup half & half, 1 cup buttermilk, 1 tsp. baking soda. Add dry ingredients to persimmon alternately with milk.  Pour into a greased 9x13 pan. Can also be made using gluten free flour mixture with delicious success. Bake at 325* for 60 minutes. Serve hot or cold with a dab of whipped cream on top.

Kellogg, L.P. 1923 Use - Medicinal

Fruit is made into a paste which is baked into loaves. "The Indians make a paste of the fruit, which they bake into loaves of the thickness of a man's finger, and of the consistence of a dried pear. The taste seems at first somewhat disagreeable, but people are easily accustomed to it. It is very nourishing, and a sovereign remedy, as they pretend, against a looseness and bloody-flux".

Rafert, S. 1996 Use - Food

Persimmons were used as a snack food when in the woods.

Aatotankiki myaamiaki 1998-2006 Use - Food

Barbara Mullin's mother, Julia Lankford, gathered wild persimmons in the woods around the homestead at Timber Hill.

Gatschet, A.S. ca. 1895 Use - Food

Persimmon fruits are dried. ". . . When the arrived home they had left at the place where he had been drying his wife persimmons . . .", "napiatchi manahwilitchi; niaha da passamelidci wiwali piakimini").

Gonella, M.P 2003-2006 Use - Food

Persimmons were used for jelly by Peggy McCord's grandmother Geboe.

Gonella, M.P 2003-2006 Horticultural Info

Harvesting and preparation for use: "They must fall to the ground to be ripe. Not quit ripe persimmons taste terrible. This time of year early October for southeast Indiana is when they start to fall. Check under the tree every day and collect. Wash and take out seeds. I take seeds out by hand. Its a messy job but very effective. You can then run the remains of the seed through a food mill to make a pulp and eliminate the skin. This is the pulp used in the recipe. The pulp can be frozen".

Peoria, Eastern Shawnee, Wyandotte, Seneca-Cayuga, Miami and Ottawa Tribes 2003 Use - Food

Persimmons are gathered for food.

Botanical Sources  
Reference Source Reference Type Data Comments
Gleason, H.A. and Cronquist, A. 1991 Habitat 

Occurs mostly in dry-soiled woods in eastern and western Myaamia lands,

Related Sources  
Reference Source Reference Type Data Comments
Masthay, C. 2002  

“Persimmon” is an English loan from the Powhatan word 'pessi-min', meaning ‘peel/husk-fruit’. Plural is 'pessi-minas', both are inanimate words. The Proto-Eastern Algonquian word for persimmon (Diospyros virginiana) is '*pehši-mini'. The Unami Delaware word for persimmon is 'xí·mi·n' for expected '*pəxi·min' (Siebert 1975, p. 367).

Dunn, J.P. ca. 1900  

"piakimindjakwi"

Gravier, J. ca. 1700  

"I remove the crown [sepals] from a persimmon, the stem from fruit".

Bush, L. L 1996  

Human-charred persimmon floral material was recovered from excavations at an early 19th century Myaamia village site at the forks of the Wabash River (Ft Wayne) 1975-1812 (Ehler Site).

McPherson, A. and S. McPherson. 1977  

The common name persimmon is of Algonquian origin and is taken from the Delaware word pasimenan, meaning dried fruit.

Pinet, P.F. 1696-circa 1700  

"piakiminja", persimmon

Tippman, D. 1999  

Jim Strack recalled seeing a recipe in a cookbook when he was growing up that called for persimmons to flavor the meat of a opossum.

Clark, J.E 1993  

The Shawnee collected this plant for food.

Bush, L. L 1996  

Archaeological studies have demonstrated that persimmons were utilized as a food resource by Late Woodland 800 A.D to 1300 A.D. indigenous peoples of central and southern Indiana.