Coromandel Ebony or East Indian Ebony (Diospyros melanoxylon) is a species of flowering

Flowering plant

The flowering plants , also known as Angiospermae or Magnoliophyta, are the most diverse group of land plants. Angiosperms are seed-producing plants like the gymnosperms and can be distinguished from the gymnosperms by a series of synapomorphies...

 tree

Tree

A tree is a perennial woody plant. It is most often defined as a woody plant that has many secondary branches supported clear of the ground on a single main stem or trunk with clear apical dominance. A minimum height specification at maturity is cited by some authors, varying from 3 m to...

 in the family Ebenaceae

Ebenaceae

The Ebenaceae are a family of flowering plants, which includes ebony and persimmon. The family has approximately 500 species of trees and shrubs in two genera, Diospyros and Euclea. The species are mostly evergreen and native to the tropics and subtropics, with a few deciduous species native to...

 that is native to India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

 and Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...

.

Its common name is derived from the coast of southeastern India, Coromandel

Coromandel Coast

The Coromandel Coast is the name given to the southeastern coast of the Indian Subcontinent between Cape Comorin and False Divi Point...

; locally it is known as temburini or by its Hindi

Hindi

Standard Hindi, or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi, also known as Manak Hindi , High Hindi, Nagari Hindi, and Literary Hindi, is a standardized and sanskritized register of the Hindustani language derived from the Khariboli dialect of Delhi...

 name tendu. In Orissa

Orissa

Orissa , officially Odisha since Nov 2011, is a state of India, located on the east coast of India, by the Bay of Bengal. It is the modern name of the ancient nation of Kalinga, which was invaded by the Maurya Emperor Ashoka in 261 BC. The modern state of Orissa was established on 1 April...

 and Jharkhand

Jharkhand

Jharkhand is a state in eastern India. It was carved out of the southern part of Bihar on 15 November 2000. Jharkhand shares its border with the states of Bihar to the north, Uttar Pradesh and Chhattisgarh to the west, Orissa to the south, and West Bengal to the east...

 it known as kendu. It is used in an Indian cigarette product known as a beedi

Beedi

A beedi is a thin, South Asian cigarette filled with tobacco flake and wrapped in a tendu leaf tied with a string at one end.The word comes from beeda, Marwari for a leaf wrapped in betel nuts, herbs, and condiments....

, where it wraps the tobacco to be smoked. The bark of the East Indian ebony is hard and dry, and burns producing sparks and sounds.

Pharmacology

The leaf of the tree contains valuable flavones. The pentacyclic triterpines found in leaves possess antimicrobial properties, while the bark shows antihyperglycemic activity. The bark of four diospyrose species found in India also found significant antiplasmocidal effects against P. falciparum.