SESAMUM INDICUM, Linn: 



[ Vide Plate XLII.] 



Description. 



Varieties. 



Area. 



English, sesame, gingelly; Vehnaculah, til, tili, gingili (Southern India) ; Sanscrit, tila ;t 

 Persian, roghen; Arabic, duhn.J 



Natural order Pedalinem, tribe Sesameoe. An annual 3-4 ft. high. Stems erect, branching, 

 angular, striate, usually thickly clothed, especially the upper part, with short hairs. Leaves on long 

 stalks, alternate or sub-opposite, crowded, very variable in shape, ovate lanceolate, tripartite or vari- 

 ously lobed, cuneate rounded or cordate at the base ; upper usually linear lanceolate, entire. 

 Flowers solitary, erect, on short pedicels. Calyx 5-parted ; segments lanceolate, acute, hairy. 

 Corolla irregular, somewhat 2-lipped ; lobes 5, broad, spreading, the lower one a little longer and 

 forming a lip, pale yellow tinged with pink. Stamens 4, didynamous, attached to the base of the 

 corolla tube and included in it. Ovary 4-celled, each carpel being divided by a spurious dissepiment, 

 oblong, hairy, surrounded at the base by a small fleshy disc. Ovules axile, many, superposed in a 

 single row in each cell. Capsule 1-2 in., oblong, quadrangular, compressed, opening from above 

 loculicidally into two valves through the false dissepiments. Seeds numerous, compressed, ovoid or 

 obliquely oblong, lower and upper margins girt with a slender sharp ridge, black brown or white. 



As its name implies til par excellence the oil plant of India, and is the source of 

 most of the sweet oil used in the country. A sweet oil is extracted from the berries 

 of the viahiia tree {Bassia latijolici), which is extensively used in those tracts where this 

 tree abounds. But the consumption of mahua oil is quite insignificant when compared 

 with that of til oil, and from an economic point of view til is more aptly comparable 

 with the olive of Mediterranean countries than with the mahua, although botanically 

 the latter is not far removed from the olive. 



There are two varieties, the black-seeded and the white-seeded ; the former being 

 generally known as til, and the latter as tili. Til ripens rather later than tili, and is 

 more commonly grown mixed with high crops such as judr, while tili does best when 

 mixed with cotton. Tili oil is preferred of the two for human consumption. 



Notwithstanding its economic importance the acreage under til is small, since it is 

 very rarely grown as a sole crop in most districts ot the Provinces. Fields of til are 

 not uncommonly met with in the districts lying immediately under the Himalayas — 

 Dehra returning 3,536 acres, Pilibhit G16 acres, Basti 1,301 acres, and Gorakhpur 857 

 acres. But the tract in which its cultivation as a sole crop is commonest is Bundel- 

 khand, and the area under til in the five districts which are geographically included in 

 this tract are shown below : — 



Districts. 

 Jalaun, ... 

 Jhansi, ... 

 Ijalitpiu', 

 Hainii'pur, 

 Baiula,... 



A crea. 



6,000 

 21,400 

 86,000 

 49,000 

 35,700 



* References :— Drury Useful Tl. Ind. 389 ; Gaz. N.-W. P. Vol. x. 771 ; Bentley and Trim. Med. tl. 198 ; DC. 

 L'Orig. PI. Cult. 337. S. orieiitale, Linu. ; Roxb. Fl. Ind. iii. 100 ; Badea-Powell Punj. Prod. 420. 

 t Piddington ludex 81. 

 t Koxb. I.e. 



F 2 



