Thilachium africanum
species of plant
Thilachium africanum is a species of flowering plant in the family Capparaceae. This shrub or small tree is native to Eswatini, Kenya, KwaZulu-Natal, Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, the Northern Provinces, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe.
Description
The species grows up to 7 meters tall with tuberous roots; branches are brown or grey and lenticellate. Leaves: simple or 3-foliate; leaflets obovate to elliptic in outline and with a leathery surface, the leaflets are about 3-9 cm long and 1-5 cm wide, apex is obtuse to rounded while base is cuneate to rounded. Inflorescence is terminal or axillary raceme like, white and green with spreading and wavy stamens. Fruit is cucumber like in shape, ellipsoid and up to 6 cm long and contains numerous seeds.
Distribution
Occurs in deciduous forests, opens woodland and riverine forests of Eastern Africa and in thickets.
Uses
Extracts of the species are used in preparations to ease pain, bark extracts are used to treat snake bites and diarrhoea among the Samburu people of Kenya. The tuberous roots are boiled and then drained a few times to reduce toxicity.
The public source identifies “Thilachium africanum” as species of plant. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Thilachium, africanum and species.
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Stable identifiers, scientific names and standards terminology offer the best bridge between this overview and specialist evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Oct 5, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q17248240. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
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This entry incorporates text from “Thilachium africanum” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.