Cycads

Encephalartos altensteinii

The name Encephalartos is derived from the Greek, and means ‘bread in the head’. This refers to the Hottentots’ practice of removing the pith from the cycad's stem and burying it in the ground for 2 months before kneading it into bread and baking it in embers. During the 2-month burial, toxins within the pith are destroyed.

The superb specimen of this cycad at Kew is one of the oldest pot plants in the world. It was collected in the Eastern Cape region of South Africa in the early 1770s and brought back to England in 1775 by Francis Masson, one of Kew's earliest plant collectors. For many years the plant was known as E. longifolius but recent studies in South Africa have proved that it is E. altensteinii. Initially planted at ground level, the cycad now measures 4 m 23 cm from the base of its stem to the growing point (an average growth rate of only 2.5 cm per year). It has produced a cone only once at Kew. On that occasion in 1819, Sir Joseph Banks came to view the plant on what proved to be his last visit to Kew.

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