PALMÆ.
SEMEN ARECÆ.
Nuces Arecæ vel Betel; Areca Nuts, Betel Nuts; F. Semence ou Noix d’Arec; G. Arekanüsse, Betelnüsse.
Botanical Origin—Areca Catechu L., a most elegant palm,[2500] with a straight smooth trunk, 40 to 50 feet high and about 20 inches in circumference. The inflorescence is arranged on a branching spadix, with the male flowers on its upper portion and the female near its base. The tree is cultivated in the Malayan Archipelago, the warmer parts of the Indian Peninsula, Ceylon, Indo-China and the Phillippines. It is probably indigenous to the first-named region.
History—The Areca palm is mentioned in the Sanskrit writings as Guvāca. It is called in Chinese Pin-lang, a name apparently derived from Pinang, a designation for the tree in the Malay Islands, whence the Chinese anciently derived their supply of the seeds. The oldest Chinese work to mention the pin-lang is the San-fu-huang-tu, a description of Chang-an, the capital of the Emperor Wu-ti, b.c. 140-86. It is there stated that after the conquest of Yunnan, b.c. 111, some remarkable trees and plants of the south were taken to the capital, and among them more than 100 pin-lang, which were planted in the imperial gardens. Bretschneider,[2501] to whose researches we are indebted for this information, cites several other Chinese works, from the first century downwards, showing that areca nuts were brought from the then unsubdued provinces of Southern China, the Malayan Archipelago and India. The custom of presenting areca nut to a guest is alluded to in a work of the 4th century.
The Arabian writers, as for instance Ibn Batuta, were well acquainted with the areca nut, which they called Fófal, and with the Indian custom of masticating it with lime.
Areca nut, though held in great estimation among Asiatics as a masticatory, and supposed to strengthen the gums, sweeten the breath and improve digestion, has not until recently been regarded as possessing any particular medicinal powers beyond those of a mild astringent.[2502] It has often been administered as a vermifuge to dogs, and in India and China is given with the same intent to the human subject. Some successful trials recently made of it for the expulsion of tapeworm have led to it being included in the Additions to the British Pharmacopœia of 1867, published in 1874.
Description—The areca palm produces a smooth ovoid fruit, of the size of a small hen’s egg, slightly pointed at its upper end, and crowned with the remains of the stigmas. Its exterior consists of a thick pericarp, at first fleshy, but, when quite mature, composed of fine stringy fibres running lengthwise, with much coarser ones below them. This fibrous coat is consolidated into a thin crustaceous shell or endocarp, which surrounds the solitary seed. The latter has the shape of a very short rounded cone, scarcely an inch in height; it is depressed at the centre of the base, and has frequently a tuft of fibres on one side of the depression, indicating its connexion with the pericarp. The testa, which seems to be partially adherent to the endocarp, is obscurely defined, and inseparable from the nucleus. Its surface is conspicuously marked with a network of veins, running chiefly from the hilum. When a seed is split open, it is seen that these veins extend downwards into the white albumen, reaching almost to its centre, thus giving the seed a strong resemblance both in structure and appearance to a nutmeg. The embryo, which is small and conical, is seated at the base of the seed. Areca nuts are dense and ponderous, and very difficult to break or cut. They have when freshly broken a weak cheesy odour, and taste slightly astringent.
Microscopic Structure—The white horny albumen is made up of large thick-walled cells, loaded with an albuminoid matter, which on addition of iodine assumes a brown hue. The cell-walls display large pores, the structure of which, after boiling in caustic ley, becomes clearly evident in polarized light. The brown tissue which runs into the albumen is of loose texture, and resembles the corresponding structure in a nutmeg. The thin walls of its cells are marked with fine spiral striations, and in this tissue, as well as on the brown surface of the seed, delicate spiral vessels are scattered. All the brown cells assume a rich red if moistened with caustic ley, and a dingy green with ferric chloride.
Chemical Composition—We have exhausted the powder of the seeds, previously dried at 100° C., with ether; and thereby obtained a colourless solution, which after evaporation left an oily liquid, concreting on cooling. This fatty matter, representing 14 per cent. of the seed, was thoroughly crystalline and melted at 39° C. By saponification we obtained from it a crystalline fatty acid fusing at 41° C., which may consequently be a mixture of lauric and myristic acids. Some of the fatty matter was boiled with water: the water on evaporation afforded an extremely small trace of tannin but no crystals, which had catechin been present should have been left.