釋迦

Posted by fun on 2006/1/24 12:50:08

The fruit 釋迦 is called sweetsop in English. But if you check that word in English-Chinese dictionaries, you will find it's called 番荔枝. 番荔枝 is its scientific name in Chinese. Most Chinese people outside Taiwan still refer to it as 番荔枝. The scientific name for sweetsop in English is (Annona squamosa). Annona is the Genus name, which refers to an island and "squamosa" is the Latin adjective for "squamous". The adjective is from its appearance. Common names for sweetsop include "sugar apple", "custard apple" and "anon."

By the way, there's another fruit that looks very much like the sweetsop. It's called cherimoya (Annona cherimola). The cherimoya is much larger than the sweetsop.

Also there's a cross between the sweetsop and the cherimoya by the name of atemoya which is called 鳳梨釋迦 here in Taiwan.