Manna – History

DESCRIPTION:

Manna is a product made from some species of trees of the Fraxinus (ash) genus, particularly the Fraxinus ornus (manna ash). The cultivation of the manna ash presumably dates back to the period of Islamic rule (IX to XI century AD); the oldest document that mentions manna dates back to 1080 in a diploma of the Bishop of Messina. Sicily became the largest producer in the second half of the nineteenth century. In some towns, manna was the main product of the local economy for local ash growers up to the 1950s. The phenomenon that drove the new generations to prefer working in cities, rather than in agriculture, strongly contributed to abandoning the cultivation of manna. Today ash groves are waiting to be regenerated to bring wealth again.