Use of Capsicum frutescens on Pohnpei Island, Mokil Atoll, and Pingelap Atoll, Federated States of Micronesia

  • Yamamoto Sota
    Research Center for the Pacific Islands, Kagoshima University, Kagoshima, Japan.

Search this article

Abstract

The local nomenclature and usage of Capsicum on Pohnpei Island, Mokil Atoll, and Pingelap Atoll, Federated States of Micronesia, were surveyed to identify the relationship between people and Capsicum. Pungent Capsicum peppers used in Pohnpei State were C. frutescens in almost all cases, and three types of C. frutescens were found. The local name for Capsicum was “sele” on Pohnpei Island and Pingelap Atoll and “jeli” on Mokil Atoll. These local names seem to be related to “chile” in Spanish, suggesting that some Capsicum peppers were introduced from the Americas to Pohnpei State by the Spanish during the Manila galleon trade. People used C. frutescens in various ways: as a condiment (on fresh or salted fruit and fruit soaked in unboiled water or the water of mature coconuts), as a vegetable (the leaves), and as a medicine (the fruit as an anthelmintic drug, the leaves for curing boils and wounds, and the flowers for promoting childbirth or blood expulsion in pregnant women). With modernization, however, residents of Pohnpei Island have been eating fewer C. frutescens leaves in recent years. Rediscovering and maintaining knowledge of plants already naturalized on each island are important to food security.

Journal

Related Projects

See more

Details

Report a problem

Back to top