The popular name of Ficus auriculata Roxburgh’s Fig follows that of Sir William Roxburgh (1751-1815) a Scottish surgeon who was appointed Superintendent of the Calcutta Botanical Gardens by the East India Company in 1793.
Roxburgh is popularly known as the ” founding father of Indian botany” as the major author of two massive botanical works (1) Plants of the Coast of Coromandel (3 volumes 1795-1815) with around 400 illustrations from which the illustration of Ficus auriculata (above) is taken, and (2) The 3 volumes of Flora Indica ((1795-1820) which is text only.
Experiments carried out on fruiting Ficus auriculata at the Calcutta Botanic Gardens by the then Superintendent George King and his colleagues described in King (1897) The Species of Ficus of the Indo-Malayan and Chinese Countries was the first detailed explanation of how dioecious figs were pollinated by fig wasps which bred in the figs of male trees and then flew to female fig trees to pollinate the female figs.