12/18/2025
Studies believe that mandarin oranges have existed in China and other parts of East and Southeast Asia for more than 1,000,000 years and were domesticated twice around the foothills of China’s Nanling Mountain region, where wild mandarins can still be found today. We may have cultivated mandarins some 80,000 years ago, but the earliest hard evidence dates back about 4,000 years. There’s a recording of mandarins being gifted to Emperor Yu the Great around 2200 BC.
Oranges, grapefruits, lemons, even Meyer lemons, and bergamots are all related to wild mandarins, as are many of today’s most commercially important citrus fruits. Tangerines are also, kinda. Some are distinct fruits grown around Tangiers in Morocco, but in the U.S. they are hybrids of mandarins and pomelos.
Gifting mandarins isn’t just for Chinese royalty. In Canada, they’re a Christmas tradition. Japanese immigrants popularized the fruit in the Great White North around the late 1800s. It’s Japanese custom to give mandarins around the New Year as a symbol of good fortune. Well that tradition spread among the non-Japanese population and across the country.🥄
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