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Lime

an important citrus fruit which seems to have originated in the region of Malaysia. While lemons are the major acid citrus fruits in the subtropics, limes are the most prominent in tropical regions. This is true of the lime in its familiar, very acid form (it has one and a half times as much acid, weight for weight, as a lemon); but, as explained below, there are various kinds of lime, including sweet limes.

It is hard to judge when the lime was first taken into cultivation, since the oldest surviving documents do not distinguish it clearly from other citrus fruits. An Indian medical work of c.ad 100 refers to both lemon and lime as jambira. The later Arabic and Persian words, laimūn and līmūn seem also to have been used for both; and most modern names for either come from this root. The lime seems not to have been known in classical times.

Although the westward path of the lime in early medieval times is hard to trace, it seems safe to assume that it was carried to Europe by the Arabs; that it was cultivated to some extent in Italy and Spain; and that, because it is better suited by a hotter climate, such cultivation did not last for long. What is sure is that, soon after the discovery of the New World by Europeans, the lime was introduced there along with other citrus fruits, and that limes quickly became abundant in the W. Indies and C. America, especially Mexico. These were the ordinary, small, acid limes. Consideration of the further spread of the fruit requires a survey of the other kinds.

The species and varieties of lime have been well surveyed by Saunt (1990), who provides the following information and more besides:

• Citrus aurantifolia, the archetypal species, the one which originated in Malaysia, which commonly bears the names West Indian, Mexican, or Key lime (the last name refers to the Florida Keys), but is sometimes referred to as the ‘true lime’. Given its original provenance, these common names are surprising. The explanation is simply that the first two of these names represent principal areas of production (most of the world production of limes is of this species, with Mexico as the leading producer, the W. Indies and Egypt coming next), while the third, as Professor Julia Morton (1987) explains, is a historic relic of the brief period (roughly 1913–23) when there was commercial production in the Florida Keys, after one hurricane had put paid to pineapple-growing there and before another hurricane more or less ended the cultivation of limes. The fruits of this lime have seeds, and propagation is usually from these seeds. It is this fruit which is the kaghzi nimbu of India, the Gallego lime of Brazil, the limun baladi of Egypt, and the doc of Morocco. This (not the so-called Persian Lime) is the lime grown in Iran, where it is known locally as Shirazi.
• C. latifolia, believed to have originated as a hybrid between the C. aurantifolia and the citron, probably came from the Orient by way of Persia and the Mediterranean, then possibly via Brazil and Australia to Tahiti, and finally to California. Against this background it is comprehensible that its common names are Persian or Tahiti Lime. But in California itself it is referred to as the Bearss Lime. The fruit, which is almost always seedless, is the only lime cultivated in the USA.
• C. limettoides, the sweet lime, often referred to as Palestine or Indian Sweet Lime, is thought to be another hybrid by origin. It has a somewhat lower sugar content than the acid limes listed above but qualifies to be called ‘sweet’ because it is almost completely devoid of acidity. A juicy fruit which enjoys popularity in the Near and Middle East and India, it is limun helou or limun succari in Egypt and mitha nimboo in Hindi.

The acid limes are thought of as green fruits (as the phrase ‘lime green’ testifies). This is because, although they would ripen to orange and then yellow if left on the tree, they are deliberately picked at the green stage, perhaps partly in order to ensure that they are not confused with lemons.

The use of fresh limes in beverages and to flavour sweet items such as a sorbet or a mousse, or in Key lime pie in the USA, is well known and becoming more familiar as the availability of fresh limes in temperate countries increases. Less familiar is the use of limes, sometimes fresh but more often dried, in savoury stews and the like in the Near/Middle East and S. Asia. In Iran, for example, dried limes are indispensable in stews (khoresht) to which they give a pleasantly musty, tangy, sour flavour. Sometimes they are split open, the pips removed, and the rest ground up into a fine powder to be sprinkled into stews and soups. They can be dried for a short time when they remain pale in appearance for light-coloured stews; or for a long time when they become very dark for use in dark-coloured stews. They are known as limoo amani (Omani limes), while the name in Oman itself, as mentioned under Arabian food, is loomi.

For other limelike fruits, see calamansi (=calamondin), and mandarin limes.

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