Basic Information on Aloe Plants
Aloe: Any of various chiefly African plants of the genus Aloe, having rosettes of succulent, often spiny-margined leaves and long stalks bearing yellow, orange, or red tubular flowers.
Aloe means any species of the genus Aloe, succulent perennials of the family Lilaceae (lily family), native to the warm dry areas of South Africa (especially Cape Province) and also to tropical Africa, but cultivated elsewhere. The juice of aloe leaves contains the purgative aloin, one of the main anthraquinones.
The Aloe Barbadensis Miller, the Aloe Saponaria, the Aloe Ferox, the Aloe Chinensis and the aloe Arborescens, are the most commercially known varieties of more than 360 species of well-known aloes.
The aloe receives diverse names, based on the languages:
- Spanish: aloe, zabira (of the Arab çabira), zabila, zabida, zadiba, toots zabila, sávila, sábila, penca sábila, toots or canary pitera, flower of the desert, loto of the desert.
- Portuguese: aloés, erva-babosa, babosa, azebre vegetal.
- Catalan: àloe, séver, atzavara verae.
- Italian: aloe.
- French: aloés.
- English: aloe.
- German: aloe.
- Chinese: Lu Hui
- Scientific names: Aloe vera (Lineo), Barbadensis Aloe (Miller), Saponaria Aloe (Haw).
Farmacological denomination: Extract = Aloes extractum. Dye = Aloes tinctura