South African botanist Christiaan Hendrik Persoon published a formal description of the Moreton Bay fig in his 1807 work "Synopsis Plantarum", the material having been reported by French botanist René Louiche Desfontaines in 1804. The type specimen has been lost but was possibly located in Florence. The specific epithet "macrophylla" is derived from the Ancient Greek "makros" "large" and "phyllon" "leaf", and refers to the size of the leaves. In the early 19th century, Italian botanist Vincenzo Tineo of the Orto botanico di Palermo in Sicily obtained a plant from a French nursery that grew to a prodigious size with a banyan habit. This form was propagated and grown in gardens around Sicily. A later director of the gardens, Antonino Borzì, described it as "Ficus magnolioides" in 1897, distinguishing it from "F. macrophylla" on account of its larger leaves with greener undersides. This name was widely used in Europe.