The
nicotine that stains the fingers of so many people in the world
today, is named for Jean Nicot, lord of Villemain (ca. 1530-1600), French
ambassador to Lisbon in 1560 when Portuguese explorers were first bringing
back tobacco seeds from the new continent of America. Nicot was given a
tobacco plant from Florida, and cultivated what is said to be the first
tobacco raised in Europe, and sent the fruits of his harvest to
France's queen mother Catherine de Mdicis and other notables. After
introducing what Catherine called the ambassador's powder (snuff) into
France, the enterprising Nicot proceeded to grow a tobacco crop that he
brought back to Paris and built a tidy fortune on. The American powder
became so popular that the tobacco plant itself was called nicotina, after
Nicot, and Linnaeus later officially named the whole Nicotiana genus of
the nightshade family in his honor, this group including the tobacco plant
most commonly cultivated today, the species Nicotiana rustica. Nicotine,
the oily liquid found in tobacco leaves, wasn't so named until 1818, when
it was first isolated. It is one of the most physiologically addictive
drugs known, producing most of the observed effects of smoking. The
alkaloid is poisonous to bugs as well as humans, and is used as an
insecticide in agriculture.
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