Phoenix dactylifera, commonly known as the Date Palm, is a palm in the genus Phoenix, extensively cultivated for its edible sweet fruit. Due to its long history of cultivation for fruit, its exact native distribution is unknown, but probably originated somewhere in the desert oases of northern Africa, and perhaps also southwest Asia. It is a medium-sized tree, 15–25 m tall, often clumped with several trunks from a single root system, but often growing singly as well.

The leaves are pinnate, 3–5 m long, with spines on the petiole and about 150 leaflets; the leaflets are 30 cm long and 2 cm broad. The full span of the crown ranges from 6–10 meters. Dates have been a staple food of the Middle East for thousands of years.

They are believed to have originated around the Persian Gulf, and have been cultivated since ancient times from Mesopotamia to prehistoric Egypt, possibly as early as 4000 B.C. There is archaeological evidence of date cultivation in eastern Arabia in 6000 B.C. (Alvarez-Mon 2006). In later times, Arabs spread dates around South & South East Asia, northern Africa, and Spain and Italy. Dates were introduced into Mexico and California by the Spaniards by 1765, around Mission San Ignacio.

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