The Black Mulberry of Hofje van Pauw

The black mulberry in the courtyard of Hofje van Pauw has been fruiting since before the Dutch East India Company's Delft chamber was a century old. Tree specialist Jorn Copijn identified it in 2023 as Morus nigra subsp. multicaulus, a subspecies not officially recorded in Europe until 1821, more than a century after this specimen was already growing here. The likely explanation involves no botanist at all: the VOC had traded out of India, where the subspecies originates, since 1700, and Delft kept its own VOC chamber from 1602, so a sea captain or merchant returning home is the more probable route than any recorded introduction. At 319 years old it ranks among the oldest fruit trees documented in the Netherlands. The hofje itself, an almshouse Elisabeth Pauw endowed by testament in 1707 for women who had fallen on hard times, still houses residents today, now adults with intellectual disabilities, and the tree has outlived every one of them. Its courtyard gate on Paardenmarkt stays unlocked during the day. Visitors are asked to keep to the garden and skip the windows, since the houses ringing the tree are still lived in, not a museum.