The genus Aesculus ( or ), with notable species including buckeye and horse chestnut, comprises 13–19 species of in the family Sapindaceae. They are and native plant to the temperateness Northern Hemisphere, with six species native to North America and seven to 13 species native to Eurasia. Several hybrids occur. Aesculus exhibits a classical Arcto-Tertiary distribution.
Ungnadia seedpods resemble the Aesculus seedpods, but belong to a different genus.
Carl Linnaeus named the genus Aesculus after the Roman name for an edible acorn. Common names for these trees include "buckeye" and "horse chestnut", though they are not in the same order as the true chestnuts, Castanea in the Fagales. Some are also called white chestnut or red chestnut. In Britain, they are sometimes called conker trees because of their link to the game of conkers, played with the seeds, which are also called conkers.
Aesculus seeds were traditionally eaten, after parboiling, by the Jōmon people of Japan over about four millennia, until 300 AD.
All parts of the buckeye or horse chestnut tree are moderately toxic, including the nut-like seeds. The toxin affects the gastrointestinal system, causing gastrointestinal disturbances. The USDA notes that the toxicity is due to saponin aescin and glucoside aesculin, with possibly contributing.
Native Americans used to crush the seeds and the resulting mash was thrown into still or sluggish waterbodies to stun or kill fish. They then boiled and drained (leached) the fish at least three times to dilute the toxin's effects. New shoots from the seeds also have been known to kill grazing cattle.
The genus was considered to be in the ditypic family Hippocastanaceae along with Billia, but phylogenetic analyses of morphological and molecular data have more recently caused this family, along with the Aceraceae ( and Dipteronia), to be included in the soapberry family (Sapindaceae).
northeast India (Sikkim) eastward to southern China (Guangxi) and northern Vietnam |
southeastern Europe |
southern Asia |
eastern Asia |
western North America |
eastern North America |
eastern North America |
eastern North America |
western North America, endemic to Baja California del Norte |
eastern North America |
eastern North America |
Japan |
The leaf of Aesculus was the official symbol of Kyiv on its coat of arms used from 1969 to 1995. It remains an official symbol of Kyiv to this day.
In the 1840 U.S. presidential campaign, candidate William Henry Harrison called himself the "log cabin and hard cider candidate", portraying himself sitting in a log cabin made of buckeye logs and drinking hard cider, causing Ohio to become known as "the Buckeye State".
In Geneva, Switzerland, an official chestnut tree is used to indicate the beginning of the Spring; every year since 1818, the tree is observed by the secretary of the Grand Council of Geneva (the local parliament), and the opening of the first leaf is recorded and announced publicly. Over the years, four different horse chestnut trees have been used for these recordings.
In North America, several native American tribes, particularly in the western and central United States, such as Miwok, Pomo, Yokut, Maidu, historically used Buckeye trees ( Aesculus spp.) like California Buckeye to harvest fish by utilizing the saponins, which had been extracted by the plant's seeds. These tribes used crushed Buckeye nuts to release saponins into streams or shallow water, where the compounds would stun or kill the fish, allowing for easier capture.
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