Doom

Chambers's Encyclopaedia, Volume 4: Dionysius to Friction, p. 58

A detailed black and white illustration of a Doom Palm (Hyphene crinita). The tree has a long, slender, slightly curved trunk and a dense, fan-like crown of long, pointed, needle-like leaves. It is shown growing in a desert landscape with sparse, low-lying vegetation and a distant horizon under a cloudy sky. — Doom Palm (Hyphene crinita).

Doom, or DUM PALM (Hyphene crinita, H. thebaica), is a palm allied to the fan-palm (Chamaerops), but remarkable for the repeated fork-like branching of its stem. It is abundant in Upper Egypt and Central Africa, sometimes growing amidst the very sands of the desert. The spongy tissue of the pericarp is eatable, and resembles gingerbread in flavour.

Source scan(s): p. 0067