châtaigne

A châtaigne is a chestnut, as is a marron, but smaller; a marron is generally a domestically improved wild chestnut. A water chestnut is a châtaigne d'eau or châtaigne d'eau chinoise.

The Castagniccia

After the misery of the Black Death, when food was scarce and labour dear, the Genoese, the medieval rulers of Corsica, wanted a secure supply of grain from their island colony.

But if Corsica sent its wheat to Genoa, it would need a new source of food to feed itself. The Genoese decided on the chestnut, and offered a bounty for every chestnut tree planted. They even passed a law that allowed people to own trees on other people’s land.

Other chestnut forests were planted around Corsica, but the trees took to the humid, mild schist slopes of Monte San Petrone south of Bastia like kudzu, and by the 16th century a whole chestnut civilization was in place. It became known as the Castagniccia, the land of the chestnut.