Curry tree
Murraya koenigii
- Names in the book
- The book records no Philippine name for this plant.
- Names from other sources
- None found. PROSEA gives names from neighbouring countries but none from the Philippines.
- Colours
- flowerwhitefruitblack
- Native range
- Indian subcontinent
- Family
- Rutaceae, filed in the book under Rutaceæ
- Printed as
- Murraya Koenigi, Spreng. (Bergera Koenigi, L.; Connarus sp., Blanco.)
- Sources
- Page 65 on Project Gutenberg · Wikipedia
The plant today
Bergera koenigii, synonym Murraya koenigii, and commonly known as curry tree, curry bush or sweet neem, is a tree in the citrus family Rutaceae, first described by Carl Linnaeus in 1767. It is native to the Indian subcontinent, southern China and mainland Southeast Asia, and it has been introduced to other parts of Southeast Asia and to Australia. Its leaves are used in many culinary dishes in India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.
Excerpt from “Curry tree” on Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Recorded in the Philippines
GBIF holds 8 records of this plant from the Philippines. The ones with map coordinates fall in 4 provinces: Compostela Valley (1), Davao del Norte (1), Laguna (1), Palawan (1).
Counts from GBIF occurrence records, October 2026. They include planted trees and garden plants, and a province with no records may only lack collectors.
What the 1901 book says
A historical record, quoted as printed. Doses and remedies here are not medical advice.
Botanical description
Leaves alternate, odd-pinnate. Leaflets obliquely ovate, acute, entire and glabrous. The testa of the seed bears no down, and may be divided into two parts. The decoction of the leaves of this species as well as the former is used to allay toothache.
Recent research
The most cited papers since 2022 that name this plant in the title, pulled from Europe PMC in October 2026. Titles are the authors' own and the findings have not been reviewed here.
- Probiotic evaluation, adherence capability and safety assessment of Lactococcus lactis strain isolated from an important herb "Murraya koenigii"
- Ethnopharmacological Effects of Urtica dioica, Matricaria chamomilla, and Murraya koenigii on Rotenone-Exposed D. melanogaster: An Attenuation of Cellular, Biochemical, and Organismal Markers
- Extract of Murraya koenigii selectively causes genomic instability by altering redox-status via targeting PI3K/AKT/Nrf2/caspase-3 signaling pathway in human non-small cell lung cancer