Malay apple
Syzygium malaccense, Myrtaceae, the myrtle family
The Malay apple is “presumed to be a native of Malaysia” and is grown from Java to Bengal and southern India. It crossed the ocean with the Portuguese, who “carried it from Malacca to Goa and from there it was introduced into East Africa”2. In Malay it is jambu merah, the red jambu, among other names; the English have called it Malay rose-apple, mountain apple and water apple2.
The fruit is “glossy, red, juicy”, sold in markets and along streets; in Java the main crop ripens in August and September, in India from May to July with a second crop in November and December2.
On the Zanzibar coast it did something no other fruit in this guide managed: it took the apple’s own name. Madan’s Swahili dictionary of 1903 defines tofaa as the fruit of the mtofaa, and the mtofaa as Jambosa malaccensis, the Malay apple3. The word is the Arabic tuffāḥ, apple; the true apple was a rarity on that coast, so the name settled on the red, apple-shaped fruit that was actually in the markets. Today’s Swahili tufaha means the apple itself.
Sources
- GBIF Backbone Taxonomy: Syzygium malaccense, Global Biodiversity Information Facility. Supports: the accepted name and family.
- Malay Apple, in Fruits of Warm Climates, Julia F. Morton, 1987, Purdue University NewCROP. Supports: the range, the Portuguese carrying it to Goa and East Africa, the names, the fruit and its seasons.
- Swahili-English Dictionary, entries Mtofaa and Tofaa, A. C. Madan, Oxford, 1903, Internet Archive. Supports: tofaa as the fruit of the mtofaa, identified as Jambosa malaccensis.