or eggplant (the name used in N. America), Solanum melongena, botanically a fruit but usually counted as a vegetable. It originated in India, and is now grown in suitable climates worldwide.
Both its names are of interest. ‘Aubergine’ has a complicated derivation, which prompted Leclerc (1927) to write:
The word aubergine is amongst those which must fill with joy the souls of those philologists whose innocent mania is to claim that every term in the language derives from Sanskrit; without in the least being forced into the tortuous acrobatics which such exercises usually entail, they may elegantly and painlessly prove that vatin gana, the name of the aubergine in Sanskrit, gave birth to the Persian badingen, from which the Arabs derived albadingen, which via the Spanish albadingena became the aubergine.
The Arabic name produced the usual modern Indian name brinjal. Meanwhile, through the Provençal corruption meringeane, another French name, melongene, became the species name of the fruit.
‘Eggplant’ is not an appropriate name for the varieties sold in western countries, most of which look like purple truncheons. However, small round white eggplants are still popular in Spain in pickled form (en escabeche). And in Asia there is a wide range of varieties with smaller fruits, including pale green and white ones which may be spherical or egg shaped. In Australia it may be eggfruit, and in W. Africa it is often called garden egg.
A third group of names, surviving in the modern Italian melanzana and Greek melitzana, may come from the Latin mala insana, meaning ‘apple of madness’ (a term used for it by dieticians of the time) although the most recent proposal is that it too is derived from the Arabic badhinjan.
Although the aubergine is believed to be of Indian origin, the first surviving mention of it is in a Chinese work on agriculture of the 5th century ad, the Ts'i Min Yao Shu.
Aubergines soon became popular throughout Asia and the Near East, since their mild flavour and spongy texture suited them for many combinations with other vegetables and meat. They arrived in Europe both through the invasion of Spain by the Moors and by means of Italian trade with the Arabs, which became important in the 13th century. A writer of this time, Albertus Magnus, mentions them. The first types to reach Europe were egg shaped, which explains the name ‘eggplant’; they included purple and whitish or yellow ones.
For a long time Europeans considered the aubergine inedible, gave it insulting names, and grew it only as an ornamental plant. But during the 15th century it gradually gained acceptance. By 1500 it was well enough known for the early Spanish and Portuguese colonists to take it to America, where it grew well and became a popular vegetable, which it still is. In the W. Indies it bears the name ‘brown jolly’, presumably a corruption of brinjal, due to Indian immigrants.
Back in Europe, the aubergine has for some time been firmly established in regional cuisines: in Greek moussaka; in the Levantine baba ghanoush—grilled, puréed aubergines with garlic, lemon juice, and parsley (‘poor man's caviar’); in the Italian melanzane parmigiana (topped with melted grana cheese); and in the Provençal mixed vegetable stew ratatouille niçoise, where it blends harmoniously with tomatoes, onions, and sweet capsicums. A frequent use in the Near East is to stuff aubergines; the shape of the larger varieties is highly suitable for this purpose.
The most famous aubergine dish is of Turkish origin and called Imam bayildi—‘the priest fainted’. This consists of aubergines stuffed with onions (also, in some recent recipes, with tomatoes) and cooked with olive oil. There are two stories about the origin of the name. One is that the priest fainted because of the deliciousness of the dish; the other is that he fainted when he heard how much oil his wife had used in making the recipe. The ability of aubergines to soak up vast amounts of oil is legendary. One way to avoid it is to cover slices with salt and leave them for a while so that the salt collapses the cells. This technique was devised to draw out the bitter juice which primitive varieties contained; but with modern aubergines bitterness is not a problem.
In India, Iran, and Afghanistan, aubergines are made into a hot pickle. There and in China and SE Asia the small, round varieties, including some no bigger than grapes, are the ones most often seen in the markets. Aubergines are nearly always eaten cooked, but the small fruits of a related wild species, S. torvum, are sometimes eaten raw (and also cooked) in Indonesia.
Facciola (1990), writing of the related S. aethiopicum, the African scarlet eggplant or garden egg, states that the orange-red fruits are cooked and eaten like aubergines.
See bitter berries.
Alan Davidson was a distinguished author and publisher, and one of the world's best-known writers on fish and fish cookery. In 1975 he retired early from the diplomatic service—after serving in, among other places, Washington, Egypt, Tunisia, and Laos, where he was British Ambassador—to pursue a fruitful second career as a food historian and food writer extraordinaire. Among his popular books are Seafood of South-East Asia, North Atlantic Seafood, and Mediterranean Seafood. In 2003, shortly before his death, he was awarded the Erasmus Prize for his contribution to European culture.
Facciola, Stephen (1990, rev edn 1998), Cornucopia: A Source Book of Edible Plants, Vista, Calif.: Kampong.
Leclerc, Henri (1927), Les Légumes de France, Paris.
