As to more northern Europe, almonds are mentioned together with other groceries and spices as early as a.d. 716, in a charter granted by Chilperic II., King of France, to the monastery of Corbie in Normandy.[943] In 812 Charlemagne ordered the trees (Amandalarii) to be introduced on the imperial farms. In the later middle ages, the cultivation of the almond was carried on about Speier and in the Rhenish Palatinate. We learn from Marino Sanudo[944] that in the beginning of the 14th century, almonds had become an important item of the Venetian trade to Alexandria. They were doubtless in large part produced by the islands of the Greek Archipelago, then under Christian rule. In Cyprus for instance, the Knights Templar levied tithes in 1411 of almonds, honey, and sesamé seed.[945]
The consumption of almonds in mediæval cookery was enormous. An inventory made in 1372 of the effects of Jeanne d’Evreux, queen of France, enumerates only 20 lb. of sugar, but 500 lb. of almonds.[946]
In the Form of Cury, a manuscript written by the master cooks of King Richard II., a.d. 1390, are receipts for “Creme of Almand, Grewel of Almand, Cawdel of Almand Mylke, Jowt of Almand Mylke,” &c.[947]
Almonds were sold in England by the “hundred” i.e. 108 lb. Rogers[948] gives the average price between 1259 and 1350 as 2d., and between 1351 and 1400 as 3⅛d. per lb.
Description—The fruit of the almond tree is a drupe, with a velvety sarcocarp which at maturity dries, splits, and drops out leaving bare and still attached to the branch, an oblong, ovate pointed stone, pitted with irregular holes. The seed, about an inch in length, is ovate or oblong, more or less compressed, pointed at the upper, blunt at the lower end, coated with a scurfy, cinnamon-brown skin or testa. It is connected with the stone or putamen by a broad funicle, which runs along its edge for more than a third of its length from the apex; hence the raphe passes downwards to the rounded end of the seed, where a scar marks the chalaza. From this, a dozen or more ramifying veins run up the brown skin towards the pointed end. After an almond has been macerated in warm water, the skin is easily removed, bringing with it the closely attached translucent inner membrane or endopleura. As the seed is without albumen, the whole mass within the testa consists of embryo. This is formed of a pair of plano-convex cotyledons, within which lie the flat leafy plumule and thick radicle, the latter slightly projecting from the pointed or basal end of the seed.
Almonds have a bland, sweet, nutty flavour. When triturated with water, they afford a pure white, milk-like emulsion of agreeable taste.
Varieties—The different sorts of almond vary in form and size, and more particularly in the firmness of the shell. This in some varieties is tender and easily broken in the hand, in others so hard as to require a hammer to fracture it. The form and size of the kernel likewise exhibit some variation. The most esteemed are those of Malaga, known in trade as Jordan Almonds. They are usually imported without the shell, and differ from all other sorts in their oblong form and large size. The other kinds of sweet almonds known in the London market are distinguished in the order of value as Valencia, Sicily, and Barbary.[949]
Microscopic Structure—Three different parts are to be distinguished in the brown coat of an almond. First, a layer of very large (as much as ⅓ mm. in diameter) irregular cells, to which the scurfy surface is due. If these brittle cells are boiled with caustic soda, they make a brilliant object for microscopic examination in polarized light. The two inner layers of the skin are made up of much smaller cells, traversed by small fibro-vascular bundles. The brown coat assumes a bluish hue on addition of perchloride of iron, owing to the presence of tannic matter.
The cotyledons consist of thin-walled parenchyme, fibro-vascular bundles being not decidedly developed. This tissue is loaded with granular albuminous matter, some of which exhibits a crystalloid aspect, as may be ascertained in polarized light. Starch is altogether wanting in almonds.
Chemical Composition—The sweet almond contains fixed oil extractable by boiling ether to the extent of 50 to 55 per cent. A produce of 50 per cent. by the hydraulic press is by no means uncommon.