Gall Oak

Quercus infectoria, the Aleppo oak, is a small oak well known for its galls, called manjakani in Malaysia and majuphal in India. Its stems are crooked and shrubby, with smooth bright-green leaves. The galls form on young branches when gall wasps sting the tree and lay larvae, and the tree's reaction makes hard, corrugated balls. They contain the highest naturally occurring level of tannin, about 50 to 70 per cent, with small amounts of free gallic and ellagic acid. The page says the galls have long been used in Asian medicine, and for softening leather and making black dye and ink. In Malaysia they are combined with other herbs as a drink for women after childbirth, and the page says the Arabs, Persians, Indians, Malays and Chinese have used them for postpartum discharge and infection. In India they serve as a dental powder and for toothache and gingivitis. Aleppo tannin, from the galls, is used to prepare gold sols for immunocytochemistry. The tree is native to Greece, Turkey and the Middle East.