| Description |
The cucumber (Cucumis sativus) is a widely-cultivated creeping vine plant in the family Cucurbitaceae that bears cylindrical to spherical fruits, used as culinary vegetables. Considered an annual plant, there are three main types: slicing, pickling, and seedless.
The cucumber originates in Asia, in a region extending from India, Nepal, Bangladesh, China (Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangxi), and Northern Thailand, but now grows on most continents, and many different types of cucumber are grown commercially and traded on the global market. In North America, a wild cucumber is a plant in the genera Echinocystis and Marah, though these are not closely related to the cucumber.
They have been cultivated for at least 3,000 years, and were eaten all year round by the Roman Emperor Tiberius. In the Middle Ages, Charlemagne had them grown for him, and the Spanish brought them to the Americas in the Columbian exchange in 1494. World production is led by China with over three quarters of the total.
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