Talk:Black cumin

Names

The latin name of Black cummin is Nigella sativa. This species is cultivated for its seeds. The English name of Nigella damascena is love in the mist and this species is cultivated for its flowers. Which of the two nigella's is the subject of this page? Roepers 06:40, 23 Apr 2004 (UTC)

The reference I'm using is "Simon and Schuster's Guide to Herbs and Spices", published in 1990. It lists Black Cumin as Nigella Damascena, and says another name for it is love-in-the-mist. It claims the plant is cultivated for its seeds. It also mentions a related fennel flower, N. Sativa L., which has seeds containing the bitter principle, but is cultivated mainly for its flowers. Do you maybe have the two species mixed up? Quadell 14:51, 23 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I'm a little new at editing in Wikipedia, so I apologize for any odd formatting

It looks like the Simon & Schuster book is confused. Nigella sativa is the culinary herb/spice, with a long history going back to the beginnings of agriculture in the Middle East (it's mentioned in the Bible).

I've seen it called Black cumin, Black caraway, Fennel-flower and even "onion seed." The fact is that it's a very strong flavor that never caught on in English-speaking countries- so there isn't a real good English common name. More than a couple of references just call it Nigella.

Nigella damascena is the plant grown as an ornamental, called "Love-in-a-mist." I've seen a reference or two to it being used as a seasoning, but I have my doubts

Chuck Entz 09:10, Jul 31, 2004 (UTC)

It's possible that S&S is wrong, it has a good reputation. Could you (or anyone) provide some references to Nigella Damascena being separate from Black Cumin? (Welcome to Wikipedia, by the way!) Quadell (talk) 17:39, Jul 31, 2004 (UTC)

On www.biblicalGardens.org dr Nigel Hepper calls Nigella sativa Black cumin on this page He wrote a book Planting a biblical garden which i have in Dutch translation. In it Nigella sativa is called Zwarte komijn (Black cumin) en Nigella damascena is called Juffertje-in-het-groen (Love in a mist). Dutch Flora's also mention Nigella Damascena as Juffertje-in-het-groen. Roepers 05:53, 9 Aug 2004 (UTC)

There was severe misinformation in that article. In English, the term "black cumin" is used for two completely different spices: Bunium persicum, which is indeed related to cumin, and Nigella sativa, which is not. Because of the botanic relation, I would prefer if only Bunium persicum were called "black cumin" in wikipedia, and some other name were used for Nigella sativa.

Note that of the three foreign names mentioned in the first paragraph, two (Hebrew kezah and Arabic habbah albarak) refer to Nigella sativa and one (Farsi zireh kuhi) refers to Bunium persicum. I have changed the article so that it is no longer explicitly wrong, although I think that it is still rather suboptimum.

If the name "black cumin" is retained for Nigella sativa, then somebody (perhaps a native English speaker) should come up with a reasonable name for Bunium persicum that can be used on wikipedia. The few books that mention this spice always call it "black cumin". This is another reason why I think that Nigella sativa should not be called "black cumin": For Nigella sativa, there are alternate names already in use, e.g., "onion seed" and "nigella". I have also seen "black seeds", but I don't suggest this name.

Nigella damascena is chiefly an ornamental and not commonly used as a spice. Its seeds look almost identical to those of 'N. sativa' and have a similar but weaker taste. I once grew plants from Nigella spice exported from India, and the plants turned out to be N. sativa. Names like "love-in-a-mist" or "virgin-in-the green" refer to N. damascena, although I cannot figure out why they are given.

Regarding my sources: The university of Melbourne runs a website whose authors try to correlate modern botanic taxonomy with traditional names. They have pages on both Nigella and Bunium. Though not infallible (who is?), this is an excellent ressource. There is not really much information on the web about B. persicum, but you can confirm some of what I said from publicly available abstracts of scientific papers that mention the name, e.g., [1], [2]. At purdue.edu, they use the name "Black cumin" for both Nigella sativa and Bunium persicum. Moreover, I had email communication with native Farsi speakers who confirmed the names "zireh e irani" and "zireh kuhi" for B. persicum and "siyah daneh" for N. sativa. -- Gernot 07. Nov. 04

I don't think it is Wikipedia's job to "come up with a name" for anything. The black cumin page should talk about black cumin. If it has two meanings in English, then it should talk about both. The page could conceivably be split into two pages, but given the lack of information about Bunium persicum I would suggest that (for now) we retain the information here. Unless someone objects I will edit the page accordingly. Gady 15:21, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

OK, I realized it was not possible to understand what edits I have in mind from my description so I did them, and if there's any objection we can always revert. BTW: I checked my own mediterrenian cookbook, and it relates to Nigella sativa as black cumin. Gady 17:51, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Good basic idea, though I really think there should be two separate pages (e.g. Black cumin (Nigella) and Black cumin (Bunium)) and this one should be a disambig page. It should be noted that the image in the article is of N. damascena and should be moved to a separate page. There is no lacy involucre under the flower in N. sativa. Thanks for separating N. sativa and N. damascena in the text. -- WormRunner | Talk 22:45, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

That would be the natural thing to do if there's enough material on the second one. Maybe someone can add something? Personally I've never seen even the first in the west, only in the east, and never even heard of the second until today. Gady 22:53, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Other names ordering

I think we should order the other common names (black seeds etc.) by communality. Anyone seen these names off the internet? I saw both "black seeds" and "Nigella" used on boxed spices sold in Egypt, and I saw "black cumin" in at least two cookbooks. Gady 15:34, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Good idea. I have seen all of them in various "off the net" places but my references are largely botanical texts (e.g. Hortus Third). The label on spice boxes is pretty persuasive for common use. Were the cookbooks certainly talking about Nigella, or about Bunium? I would be really happy to see the two articles split with disambig. -- WormRunner | Talk 16:17, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

One of them yes, I checked a few days ago. The other one probably, but I don't have it with me. About the boxed spices, remember that I saw them in a supermarket in Egypt, so probably they were not written by native English speakers. On the other hand, it's not like you can go into a supermarket in the states and get them... Gady 16:35, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Actually there is a market near here where they have many middle eastern spices. I will check it out. Still probably not written by native speakers, but "how one usually sees the name" is important. -- WormRunner | Talk 17:11, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

What to do with this page

In Britain at least Nigella sativa seed, as a spice, is now normally sold under the Hindi name Kalonji; "black cumin" is distinctly old-fashioned, only found as a name in older cookbooks. I'd suggest running down this page (I've started a bit) to a simple disambig page, with links to the two species at their scientific names but little more, as the two plants don't have anything much in common (even as spices, they aren't used in the same way, as far as I know). Nigella sativa now has a page describing the plant botanically, but for the moment linking back here (via the kalonji redirect) for the spice use details. I've not done anything about Bunium persicum yet. - MPF 10:41, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I have reduced it to a simple disambiguation page, in line with Wikipedia:Manual of Style (disambiguation pages). In particular, I have removed all links that do not go to possible senses of "black cumin", and as best I could removed information not directly related helping the reader choose the sense she needs. I also removed the category, since both of the target articles are already in the category, and I moved the interwiki link to Nigella sativa where it belonged. — Pekinensis 20:37, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

Nigella sativa is sold as kalonji, is a component of the Bengali spice mix panch poran. It is sometimes refered to as 'wild black onion seed' but is no relation. In Indian cuisine, it is commonly used as a garnish on naan (bread) and in an Iranian chicken dish. Black cumin is Bunium Persicum, and is used extensively in regional cuisine of Kashmir and Jammu, and possibly the Punjab. It is blacker than ordinary cumin, thinner, maybe a little longer, and has a slight medicinal smell/taste. It is harvested from the wild in K&J, as the seed is very difficult to germinate. It is very often confused with caraway, which is probably not grown in India (to be confirmed) Katzer (private comm)found no evidence of it in N India, only Bunium Persicum. Waaza 9th July 2005

Elwendia persica

I think black cumin is Elwendia persica, not Bunium bulbocastanum. 173.88.246.138 (talk) 13:45, 2 August 2020 (UTC)