140 DR. G. BIRDWOOD ON THE GENUS BOSWELLIA. 
which Carter found produced the frankincense of the Hadramaut—and also that Bos- 
wellia thurifera (including B. glabra) of India, and B. papyrifera of Abyssinia, whilst 
thuriferous species, are not known to yield any of the olibanum of commerce. 
It is very surprising that so great weight of evidence in favour of frankincense being 
produced in Arabia Felix and the Soumali country should ever have been set aside for 
the idle fancy that India was the source of the olibanum of commerce. Twenty years 
ago, it was clearly demonstrated that Arabia produced it, and one at least of the 
plants which produced it was fully described and figured. The error has proved as 
inveterate as the fiction that frankincense was yielded by Juniperus Lycia. Cole- 
brooke's discovery was in 1807. In volume i. of Woodville and Hooker's ‘ Medical 
Botany,' London, 1832, olibanum is still said to be derived from Juniperus Lycia; and it is 
added, “it is brought from Turkey and the East Indies, but that which comes from 
India is less esteemed.” But in vol. ii. B. serrata, Rox. (B. thurifera, Colebrooke), is 
adopted as its source, and it is added, in reference to the new view, that olibanum is 
obtained from India, * but it is also brought from the Levant in casks and chests." 
Fleming”, in 1810, wrote, “ That naturalists should have remained in ignorance and 
in errour, until almost the present day, respecting the tree which yields a substance 
so long known, and so universally used, must appear not a little surprising. Such, 
however, is the fact, and the merit of having discovered the true origin of this celebrated 
incense, is due to Mr. Colebrooke, who has ascertained and proved most satisfactorily, 
that the olibanum, or frankincense of the ancients, is not the gum-resin of the Juniperus 
Lycia, as was generally supposed, but the produce of our Boswellia thurifera.” 
In Waterson's * Cyclopædia of Commerce,’ in 1847, it is stated, ** Olibanum comes from 
India. An Arabian kind formerly imported from the Levant is now seldom met with, 
and its origin is a matter of doubt."  . 
Pereira, in the editions of his * Materia Medica’ previous to 1857, says that “ olibanum is 
imported from India, in chests, and that African or Arabian olibanum is rarely met with 
in this country.” But in the edition of 1857, by Taylor and Rees, it is said, “ Strictly 
speaking, there does not seem to be any Indian variety [i. e. commercial ?] of this 
gum, but, like acacia and myrrh, it reaches Bombay from the Persian Gulf.”  Royle, in 
all the editions of his ‘Manual of Materia Medica, even in the posthumous edition of 
1868, edited by Headland, says that there are two kinds of olibanum :—“ Indian, which 
is the most esteemed," and “is imported in chests chiefly from Bombay ; and African, 
which is no doubt produced on the hills of the Soumali coast westward, from Cape 
Guardafui, and carried to the Arabian coast, chiefly by native boats from Moculla." In 
- Maunder's * Treasury of Botany,’ London, 1866, edited by Lindley and Moore, it is written, 
* B. thurifera furnishes the gum-resin known as olibanum, which is supposed to have 
been the frankincense of the ancients. African olibanum, a drug rarely met with in 
this country, has been conjectured with much probability to be the product of B. papy- 
rifera.” But the most surprising surrender to this false summons is that of the profes- 
sion of interpreters of the Bible. ‘Tristram, in his ‘ Natural History of the Bible,’ London, 
1807, writes, * Frankincense, the fragrant gum of an Indian tree, procured through 
1 Asiatic Researches, vol. xi. 
