White Marseilles

White Marseilles has a genuinely documented association with Thomas Jefferson, who first encountered it while serving as America's ambassador to France and brought cuttings home to Monticello, calling it in an 1809 letter "unquestionably superior to any fig I have ever seen." He shared cuttings widely, including with John Hartwell Cocke of Bremo Plantation. The variety is traditionally grown throughout Provence and has long been part of the traditional 13 Provençal Christmas dishes. That said, there is genuine, ongoing uncertainty within the fig-collecting community about whether the "White Marseilles" commercially available today is actually the same historical variety Jefferson grew — some collectors and even Monticello's own restoration history suggest the fig now planted there was sourced from a nearby tree believed to be a White Marseilles rather than a confirmed direct descendant of Jefferson's original planting, and Condit's formal historical description does not perfectly match some modern commercial stock sold under this name. The fruit, when true to type, has green to yellow skin and amber flesh with a rich honey flavor and good resistance to rain and humid climates.