06/04/2026
A Rhubarb By Many Names!
You might be able to recognize rhubarb in the garden—but what is “true rhubarb”? If you don’t know the answer, then you have a lot in common with Western Europeans from the 1500s to 1800s.
Today, the common name “rhubarb” usually refers to the genus Rheum, which—according to a source from December 2020—contains 103 species spanning multiple continents. In China, rhubarb had been identified as a medicine in its earliest eras—possibly as far back as legendary figure Shennong’s reign in the 28th century BCE.
Throughout the 1700s, there was a European frenzy to acquire amongst all species the “true Rubarbe” medicine (known today as China’s Rheum officinale), with its strong purgative qualities thought to best rid “the body of choler and flegme.”
This frenzy invaded overseas to John Bartram’s garden around 1740, where Bartram’s patron Peter Collinson sent seeds of “Siberian rhubarbe,” the latest rumored “true” medicinal rhubarb. Possibly a misidentified culinary variety (Rheum undulatum), this was grown to maturity by Bartram in Lenapehoking soil.
Later, Bartram would receive what was probably meant to be seeds of Rheum palmatum from Benjamin Franklin around 1770, who also insisted that this rhubarb was the “True” kind.
But several decades earlier, John Batram had likely been growing what Collinson called the English “rhapontick,” or Rheum rhabarbarum (now considered by many to be synonymous with Rheum undulatum), the culinary variety we on Lenapehoking land might recognize best today.
And yet these modern-day identifications are still up for debate. Is your head spinning? Might we suggest a rhubarb tart to take your mind off of it?
[IMAGE 1: Common garden rhubarb, Rheum rhabarbarum (or Rheum undulatum), alongside other plants such as horseradish, elecampane, and chamomile. Photo taken in the Kitchen Garden on-site, late spring, May 12, 2026.]
[IMAGE 2: Common garden rhubarb, Rheum rhabarbarum (or Rheum undulatum). Photo taken in the Kitchen Garden on-site, late spring, May 12, 2026.]
[IMAGE 3: Rhubarb leaf print made by Joseph Breintnall. Dated November 23, 1738, and noted “A Leaf of Rhubarb and withered. Somewhat hurt by the Frost” Likely a garden rhubarb Rheum rhabarbarum, but possibly another species instead. Photo credit: Library Company of Philadelphia, vol. 1, page 128.]
[IMAGE 4: Rheum undulatum, as seen in Carl Linnaeus’s Amoenitates Academicae, volume 3, 1751, page 230, “Tabl V”. Found via P. Pablo Ferrer-Gallego, who lectotypified (identified) the species as it might be named around that time using modern terms. www.jstor.org/stable/27016758]
[IMAGE 5: Rheum palmatum. Published by Dr. Woodville, October 1790. Via Butler University Special Collections, Peloton Botanical Print Collection. jstor.org/stable/community.34102536]
[IMAGE 6: Non-lectotypified rhubarb species: “Patience,” or “Monkes Rubarbe,” “Leaf of the Bastard Rubarbe,” and “True [English] Rubarbe.” Via John Parkinson’s Theatrum Botanicum, 1640. www.biodiversitylibrary.org/bibliography/152383]
[IMAGE 7: Recipe for rhubarb tart in letter from Peter Collinson to John Bartram, 1739. “[...] I have this Day Received a letter from Petersburgh and am assured per Docr Amman professor of Botany there that the Siberian Rhubarb is the true sort — I wish a Quantity was produced with you to try the experiment [...] both this and the Rhapontick make excellent tarts before most other Fruits f**t for that purpose are ripe [...] all you have to Do is to take the stalks from the Root & from the Leaves, peel off the Rind and cutt them in Two or Three pieces and putt them in crust with sugar & a little Cinnamon, then Bake the Pye or Tarts [...] Eats Best Cold, it is much admired here, and has none of the Effects that the Roots Have, it eats most like Gooseberry Pye[...]” Via The Correspondence of John Bartram, published 1992.]
[IMAGE 8: Sources cited; text layered against photo of common garden rhubarb, Rheum rhabarbarum.]
