Persimmon Persimmon The persimmon (sometimes spelled persimon) is the edible fruit of a number of species of trees in the genus "Diospyros". The most widely cultivated of these is the Asian or Japanese persimmon, "Diospyros kaki". "Diospyros" is in the family Ebenaceae, and a number of non-persimmon species of the genus are grown for ebony timber. The word "Diospyros" comes from the ancient Greek words "dios" ("δῐος") and "pyron" ("πῡρον"). A popular etymology construed this as "divine fruit", or as meaning "wheat of Zeus" or "God's pear" and "Jove's fire". The dio-, as shown by the short vowel 'i' has nothing
Lissocarpa Lissocarpa Lissocarpa is a genus of flowering plants, described as a genus in 1876. It is classified as belonging to the family Ebenaceae, the ebony and diospyros family. It includes only a few species of small evergreen trees and shrubs species native to tropical South America. "Lissocarpa" species share various characters with other members of Ebenaceae, e.g., the black color of roots and bark, extrafloral nectaries on abaxial leaf surfaces, a persistent calyx, unisexual flowers, biovulate carpels with pendulous ovules, and a similar wood anatomy producing a hard, dark heartwood timber similar to ebony. They are slow-growing trees found on