Sal
Encyclopedia
Shorea robusta, also known as sal or shala tree, is a species of tree belonging to the Dipterocarpaceae
family.
-_new_leaves_with_flower_buds_at_jayanti,_duars_w_picture_120.jpg)
This tree is native to the Indian Subcontinent
, ranging south of the Himalaya, from Myanmar
in the east to Nepal
, India
and Bangladesh
.
In Nepal
, it is found mostly in the terai
region from east to west, especially, in the Churia range (the Shivalik Hill Churia Range) in the subtropical climate zone. There are many protected areas, such as Chitwan National Park, Bardiya National Park Bardia National Park, Shukla Phat National Parks, etc., where there are dense forests of huge sal trees. It is also found in the lower belt of the hilly region and inner terai.
In India, it extends from Assam
, Bengal
, Orissa
and Jharkhand
west to the Shivalik Hills in Haryana
, east of the Yamuna
. The range also extends through the Eastern Ghats
and to the eastern Vindhya
and Satpura
ranges of central India. It is often the dominant tree in the forests where it occurs.
Sal is moderate to slow growing, and can attain heights of 30 to 35 m and a trunk diameter of up to 2-2.5 m. The leaves
are 10–25 cm long and 5–15 cm broad. In wetter areas, it is evergreen
; in drier areas, it is dry-season deciduous
, shedding most of the leaves in between February to April, leafing out again in April and May.
In Hindu
tradition, the sal tree is said to be favoured by Vishnu
. Its name shala, shaal or sal, comes from Sanskrit
; other names in the Sanskrit language are ashvakarna, chiraparna and sarja, among many others.
The sal tree is often confused with the ashoka tree
(Saraca indica) in the ancient literature of the Indian Subcontinent
.
In Buddhist tradition, it is said that Queen Māyā of Sakya gave birth to Gautama Buddha
under a sal tree or an asoka tree in a garden in Lumbini
, in south Nepal
, while grasping its branch. When this event took place, Queen Māyā was en route to birth him in his grandfather's kingdom.
There is a standard decorative element of Hindu Indian sculpture
which originated in a yakshi grasping the branch of a flowering tree while setting her foot against its roots. This decorative sculptural element was integrated into Indian temple architecture as salabhanjika
or "sal tree maiden", although it is not clear either whether it is a sal tree or an asoka tree.
In Kathmandu Valley of Nepal, one can find typical Nepali pagoda temple architectures with very rich wooden carvings, and most of the temples, such as Nyatapol Temple (Nyatapola
), are made of bricks and sal tree wood.
timber in India, with hard, coarse-grained wood that is light in colour when freshly cut, but becomes dark brown with exposure. The wood is resinous and durable, and is sought-after for construction, although not well suited to planing and polishing. The wood is specially suitable for constructing frames for doors and windows.
The dry leaves of sal are a major source for the production of leaf plates and leaf bowls in northern and eastern India. The leaves are also used fresh to serve ready made paan
(betelnut preparations) and small snacks such as boiled black grams, gol gappa, etc. The used leaves/plates are readily eaten by goats and cattle that roam the streets freely. The tree has therefore protected northern India from a flood of styrofoam and plastic plates that would have caused tremendous pollution. In South India
, fresh plantain
and banana
leaves are used instead.
Sal tree resin, ṛla in Sanskrit, is used as an astringent
in Ayurvedic medicine. It is also burned as incense
in Hindu ceremonies, and sal seeds and fruit are a source of lamp oil and vegetable fat.
Dipterocarpaceae
Dipterocarpaceae is a family of 17 genera and approximately 500 species of mainly tropical lowland rainforest trees. The family name, from the type genus Dipterocarpus, is derived from Greek and refers to the two-winged fruit...
family.
Distribution and description
Indian subcontinent
The Indian subcontinent, also Indian Subcontinent, Indo-Pak Subcontinent or South Asian Subcontinent is a region of the Asian continent on the Indian tectonic plate from the Hindu Kush or Hindu Koh, Himalayas and including the Kuen Lun and Karakoram ranges, forming a land mass which extends...
, ranging south of the Himalaya, from Myanmar
Myanmar
Burma , officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar , is a country in Southeast Asia. Burma is bordered by China on the northeast, Laos on the east, Thailand on the southeast, Bangladesh on the west, India on the northwest, the Bay of Bengal to the southwest, and the Andaman Sea on the south....
in the east to Nepal
Nepal
Nepal , officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, is a landlocked sovereign state located in South Asia. It is located in the Himalayas and bordered to the north by the People's Republic of China, and to the south, east, and west by the Republic of India...
, 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 Bangladesh
Bangladesh
Bangladesh , officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh is a sovereign state located in South Asia. It is bordered by India on all sides except for a small border with Burma to the far southeast and by the Bay of Bengal to the south...
.
In Nepal
Nepal
Nepal , officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, is a landlocked sovereign state located in South Asia. It is located in the Himalayas and bordered to the north by the People's Republic of China, and to the south, east, and west by the Republic of India...
, it is found mostly in the terai
Terai
The Terai is a belt of marshy grasslands, savannas, and forests located south of the outer foothills of the Himalaya, the Siwalik Hills, and north of the Indo-Gangetic Plain of the Ganges, Brahmaputra and their tributaries. The Terai belongs to the Terai-Duar savanna and grasslands ecoregion...
region from east to west, especially, in the Churia range (the Shivalik Hill Churia Range) in the subtropical climate zone. There are many protected areas, such as Chitwan National Park, Bardiya National Park Bardia National Park, Shukla Phat National Parks, etc., where there are dense forests of huge sal trees. It is also found in the lower belt of the hilly region and inner terai.
In India, it extends from Assam
Assam
Assam , also, rarely, Assam Valley and formerly the Assam Province , is a northeastern state of India and is one of the most culturally and geographically distinct regions of the country...
, Bengal
Bengal
Bengal is a historical and geographical region in the northeast region of the Indian Subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal. Today, it is mainly divided between the sovereign land of People's Republic of Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal, although some regions of the previous...
, 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...
west to the Shivalik Hills in Haryana
Haryana
Haryana is a state in India. Historically, it has been a part of the Kuru region in North India. The name Haryana is found mentioned in the 12th century AD by the apabhramsha writer Vibudh Shridhar . It is bordered by Punjab and Himachal Pradesh to the north, and by Rajasthan to the west and south...
, east of the Yamuna
Yamuna
The Yamuna is the largest tributary river of the Ganges in northern India...
. The range also extends through the Eastern Ghats
Eastern Ghats
The Eastern Ghats or Eastern Ghauts are a discontinuous range of mountains along India's eastern coast. The Eastern Ghats run from West Bengal state in the north, through Orissa and Andhra Pradesh to Tamil Nadu in the south passing some parts of Karnataka. They are eroded and cut through by the...
and to the eastern Vindhya
Vindhya Range
The Vindhya Range is a range of older rounded mountains and hills in the west-central Indian subcontinent, which geographically separates the Indian subcontinent into northern India and Southern India.- Introduction :...
and Satpura
Satpura Range
The Satpura Range is a range of hills in central India. The range rises in eastern Gujarat state near the Arabian Sea coast, running east through Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh to Chhattisgarh. The range parallels the Vindhya Range to the north, and these two east-west ranges divide the...
ranges of central India. It is often the dominant tree in the forests where it occurs.
Sal is moderate to slow growing, and can attain heights of 30 to 35 m and a trunk diameter of up to 2-2.5 m. The leaves
Leaf
A leaf is an organ of a vascular plant, as defined in botanical terms, and in particular in plant morphology. Foliage is a mass noun that refers to leaves as a feature of plants....
are 10–25 cm long and 5–15 cm broad. In wetter areas, it is evergreen
Evergreen
In botany, an evergreen plant is a plant that has leaves in all seasons. This contrasts with deciduous plants, which completely lose their foliage during the winter or dry season.There are many different kinds of evergreen plants, both trees and shrubs...
; in drier areas, it is dry-season deciduous
Deciduous
Deciduous means "falling off at maturity" or "tending to fall off", and is typically used in reference to trees or shrubs that lose their leaves seasonally, and to the shedding of other plant structures such as petals after flowering or fruit when ripe...
, shedding most of the leaves in between February to April, leafing out again in April and May.
Religious significance
Hindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...
tradition, the sal tree is said to be favoured by Vishnu
Vishnu
Vishnu is the Supreme god in the Vaishnavite tradition of Hinduism. Smarta followers of Adi Shankara, among others, venerate Vishnu as one of the five primary forms of God....
. Its name shala, shaal or sal, comes from Sanskrit
Sanskrit
Sanskrit , is a historical Indo-Aryan language and the primary liturgical language of Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism.Buddhism: besides Pali, see Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Today, it is listed as one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and is an official language of the state of Uttarakhand...
; other names in the Sanskrit language are ashvakarna, chiraparna and sarja, among many others.
The sal tree is often confused with the ashoka tree
Ashoka tree
Saraca asoca is a plant belonging to the Caesalpiniaceae subfamily of the legume family. It is an important tree in the cultural traditions of the Indian Subcontinent and adjacent areas.-Description:...
(Saraca indica) in the ancient literature of the Indian Subcontinent
Indian subcontinent
The Indian subcontinent, also Indian Subcontinent, Indo-Pak Subcontinent or South Asian Subcontinent is a region of the Asian continent on the Indian tectonic plate from the Hindu Kush or Hindu Koh, Himalayas and including the Kuen Lun and Karakoram ranges, forming a land mass which extends...
.
In Buddhist tradition, it is said that Queen Māyā of Sakya gave birth to Gautama Buddha
Buddha
In Buddhism, buddhahood is the state of perfect enlightenment attained by a buddha .In Buddhism, the term buddha usually refers to one who has become enlightened...
under a sal tree or an asoka tree in a garden in Lumbini
Lumbini
Lumbinī is a Buddhist pilgrimage site in the Rupandehi district of Nepal. It is the place where Queen Mayadevi gave birth to Siddhartha Gautama, who as the Buddha Gautama founded the Buddhist tradition. The Buddha lived between roughly 563 and 483 BCE...
, in south Nepal
Nepal
Nepal , officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, is a landlocked sovereign state located in South Asia. It is located in the Himalayas and bordered to the north by the People's Republic of China, and to the south, east, and west by the Republic of India...
, while grasping its branch. When this event took place, Queen Māyā was en route to birth him in his grandfather's kingdom.
There is a standard decorative element of Hindu Indian sculpture
Sculpture in India
The first sculptures in the Indian subcontinent date back to the Indus Valley civilization, where stone and bronze carvings have been discovered. This is one of the earliest instances of sculpture in the world. Later, as Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism developed further, India produced some of the...
which originated in a yakshi grasping the branch of a flowering tree while setting her foot against its roots. This decorative sculptural element was integrated into Indian temple architecture as salabhanjika
Salabhanjika
Salabhanjika refers to the sculpture of a woman, displaying stylized feminine features, standing near a tree and grasping a branch. The name of these figures comes from the Sanskrit śālabañjika meaning 'breaking a branch of a sala tree'...
or "sal tree maiden", although it is not clear either whether it is a sal tree or an asoka tree.
In Kathmandu Valley of Nepal, one can find typical Nepali pagoda temple architectures with very rich wooden carvings, and most of the temples, such as Nyatapol Temple (Nyatapola
Nyatapola
Nyatapola Temple is a 5 story pagoda located in Bhaktapur, Nepal. The temple was erected by Nepali King Bhupatindra Malla during a 5 month period from late 1701 into 1702. It is the temple of Siddha Laxmi, the Hindu goddess of prosperity....
), are made of bricks and sal tree wood.
Uses
Sal is one of the most important sources of hardwoodHardwood
Hardwood is wood from angiosperm trees . It may also be used for those trees themselves: these are usually broad-leaved; in temperate and boreal latitudes they are mostly deciduous, but in tropics and subtropics mostly evergreen.Hardwood contrasts with softwood...
timber in India, with hard, coarse-grained wood that is light in colour when freshly cut, but becomes dark brown with exposure. The wood is resinous and durable, and is sought-after for construction, although not well suited to planing and polishing. The wood is specially suitable for constructing frames for doors and windows.
The dry leaves of sal are a major source for the production of leaf plates and leaf bowls in northern and eastern India. The leaves are also used fresh to serve ready made paan
Paan
Paan, from the word pān is an Indian, Pakistani, Uttarvarshi and Southeast Asian tradition of chewing betel leaf with areca nut and slaked lime paste, and katha brown powder paste, with many regional and local variations...
(betelnut preparations) and small snacks such as boiled black grams, gol gappa, etc. The used leaves/plates are readily eaten by goats and cattle that roam the streets freely. The tree has therefore protected northern India from a flood of styrofoam and plastic plates that would have caused tremendous pollution. In South India
South India
South India is the area encompassing India's states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu as well as the union territories of Lakshadweep and Pondicherry, occupying 19.31% of India's area...
, fresh plantain
Plantain
Plantain is the common name for herbaceous plants of the genus Musa. The fruit they produce is generally used for cooking, in contrast to the soft, sweet banana...
and banana
Banana
Banana is the common name for herbaceous plants of the genus Musa and for the fruit they produce. Bananas come in a variety of sizes and colors when ripe, including yellow, purple, and red....
leaves are used instead.
Sal tree resin, ṛla in Sanskrit, is used as an astringent
Astringent
An astringent substance is a chemical compound that tends to shrink or constrict body tissues, usually locally after topical medicinal application. The word "astringent" derives from Latin adstringere, meaning "to bind fast"...
in Ayurvedic medicine. It is also burned as incense
Incense
Incense is composed of aromatic biotic materials, which release fragrant smoke when burned. The term "incense" refers to the substance itself, rather than to the odor that it produces. It is used in religious ceremonies, ritual purification, aromatherapy, meditation, for creating a mood, and for...
in Hindu ceremonies, and sal seeds and fruit are a source of lamp oil and vegetable fat.