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Larsa was an important city of ancient Sumer, the center of the cult of the sun god Utu. It lies some 25 km southeast of Uruk in Iraq's Dhi Qar Governorate, near the east bank of the Shatt-en-Nil canal at the site of the modern settlement Tell as-Senkereh or Sankarah.<br/><br/> The city became a political force during the Isin-Larsa period (3rd Century BCE).
The nutmeg tree is any of several species of trees in genus Myristica. The most important commercial species is Myristica fragrans, an evergreen tree indigenous to the Banda Islands in the Moluccas (or Spice Islands) of Indonesia. The nutmeg tree is important for two spices derived from the fruit: nutmeg and mace.<br/><br/> Nutmeg is the seed of the tree, roughly egg-shaped and about 20 to 30 mm (0.8 to 1 in) long and 15 to 18 mm (0.6 to 0.7 in) wide, and weighing between 5 and 10 g (0.2 and 0.4 oz) dried, while mace is the dried 'lacy' reddish covering or aril of the seed. The first harvest of nutmeg trees takes place 7–9 years after planting, and the trees reach full production after 20 years. Nutmeg is usually used in powdered form. This is the only tropical fruit that is the source of two different spices.<br/><br/> The common or fragrant nutmeg, Myristica fragrans, native to the Banda Islands of Indonesia, is also grown in Penang Island in Malaysia and the Caribbean, especially in Grenada. It also grows in Kerala in southern India.
Jean-François de Galoup, Comte de La Pérouse (August 23, 1741-1788) was a French explorer and naval officer. In 1785, the King of France commissioned La Perouse to head an expedition to explore the Pacific Ocean, to investigate whaling and fur prospects, and to establish French claims in this area. La Pérouse had admired the explorer James Cook, and wanted to continue his work.<br/><br/> La Perouse was assigned two 500-ton ships called the Astrolabe and the Boussole. His crew of 114 included sailors, scientists, a physicist, three draftsmen, three naturalists, clergymen, and a mathematician. They left France in August, 1785.<br/><br/> La Perouse mapped the west coast of North America in 1786, and visited Easter Island and Hawaii. His ships reached the west coast of Alaska in 1786 and did extensive mapping of the North American west coast from Alaska to Monterey, California.<br/><br/> Next La Pérouse landed at Botany Bay (Port Jackson), Australia, before heading for the Solomon Islands. La Pérouse took the opportunity to send his journals, some charts and also some letters back to Europe with a British naval ship. He wrote that he expected to be back in France by June 1789, however neither he, nor any of his men, were seen again. Fortunately the valuable written documents that he dispatched with the Sirius from the in-progress expedition were returned to Paris, where they were published posthumously.<br/><br/> Both of La Perouse's ships were lost in a storm close to the Solomons in 1788. No survivors were ever found.
Originally colonized by the Portuguese in 1511, the 10 tiny volcanic islands of Banda, or Maluku, were then administered by the Dutch East Indies Company, which plundered the islands of its spices, including nutmeg, cloves and mace. After holding the Bandanese spice trade monopoly for 200 years, the Dutch were finally expelled when the British captured the Bandas in 1810.