Twilight of the baobabs? DeepEarth Photography / Alamy Stock Photo
500 BC. In Rome, King Tarquin the Proud has been sent into exile and there’s a brand new Roman republic. At around the same time, in what is now Zimbabwe, an elephant defecates after feasting on baobab fruits. A seed sprouts in the dung.
That tree grew for nearly 2500 years. It grew as the Roman Empire rose and fell, and the Kingdom of Zimbabwe flourished and collapsed, and as British colonisers came and left. The Panke baobab was the oldest flowering tree in the world until 2010…
