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THE TRUFFLE

purchase
conservation
recipes
the history
the science

THE HISTORY

The truffle probably appeared on our planet approximately 100 million years ago.
The Babylonians first mentioned them in literature around 3700 AD, followed by the Pharoe Cheope (circa 2600 Ad, lover of truffles cooked in duck fat), who offered his ambassadors meals garnished with truffles. Jacob, circa 1600 AD was familiar with, and adored truffles, cataloguing their existence in his scriptures.

The Greeks also revered truffles as a delicacy and Plutarch believed their creation was a result of thunder, water and earth coming together. Plinio the Great in his oeuvre ‘Naturalis Historia’ (23-79 AD), refers to them as different to other fungi and mushrooms, claiming their qualities form alterations in the earth’s constituents; The autumn rainfall and thunder favoring their growth, their development lasting no more than a year.
The Romans, great lovers of truffles, instead believed that their creation was due to the Gods’ will to chose a “divine tree”, the oak tree.

After the fall of the Roman Empire (456 DC), the truffle lost somewhat its prestige, and was no longer used in recipes. It is thought that for its presumed aphrodisiac properties, it became the “devil’s truffle”: dammed and precedent to perdition.
Instead the Renaissance, synonymous with an awakened interest in truffles as a delicacy, there are several mentions of them from academics and literary figures alike.
In 1564 the doctor Alfonso Ciccarelli di Bevagna in Umbria, publishes “Opuscoum de Tuberis” , and for the first time the truffle gets a broader treatment from several points of view, general morphology, development and medicinal, therapeutic and culinary uses, considering also the possibility of cultivating them.

One of the first ever documents known to man on the topic, in which appear the ‘Tartufai’ (diggers) dates back to 1400, from the financial records of the Spoleto Town Hall where along with other commercial produce, truffles where subject to a tax. From then on there are many commercial exchanges between Florentine merchants and French ones, and in 1600 shop owners from Norcia recorded arduous journeys in search of the produce. In 1780 M.J. De Borch acknowledges three separate species of truffles; the Tuber Brumal, The tuber Melanosporum and the T. Aestivum all under one category, and the White variety considered superior.
In 1778 Vittorio Pico, professor of Medicine and natural history from the first time gives white truffles a name of their own: Tuber Magnatum Pico.

The quintessential oeuvre where truffles were best catalogued was that of the young Doctor Carlo Vittadini; responsible for a rigorous analysis of each characteristic of the various species, giving them all scientific names.
In the second half of the 19th century the academic A. Chatin, adds much depth of knowledge to what was known about truffles, recording an astonishing 21 species, divided in three main categories.
Research and studies on truffles were thereafter undertaken in many other countries around the world; leaving Italy at the apex of the global industry, from a qualitative and quantitative point of view.