What is the genus of the chickpea plant?

The genus of the chickpea plant is Cicer.

The cultivated chickpea’s full scientific name is Cicer arietinum: Cicer is the genus and arietinum is the species name. Scientific names use this two-part system, called binomial nomenclature, to identify organisms precisely across languages and regions.

Carl Linnaeus described the chickpea in the first edition of Species Plantarum in 1753. The genus name derives from the Latin word cicer, meaning chickpea. The genus belongs to the legume family Fabaceae and contains both cultivated and wild chickpea relatives.

Cicer arietinum is the only currently cultivated species in the genus. Its wild progenitor is Cicer reticulatum, native to southeastern Turkey. Researchers study that wild relative because it preserves genetic traits that may help breeders improve cultivated chickpeas, including resilience and nutritional characteristics.

The alternatives are related-sounding legume genera: Pisum contains peas, Lens contains lentils, and Vicia includes plants such as broad beans. They are all legumes, but none is the chickpea’s genus.