There is a good deal of confusion over the shrub associated with the discovery of Hiram's grave but it is most probable that it would have been cassia and not acacia.
The cassia plant (one species is Cassia. actor/à/0) was introduced into Europe in the early eighteenth century at the time when the ritual was developing.
Samuel Prichard's Masonry Dissected (1730) and Anderson's 1738 Constitutions both mention cassia rather than acacia in relation to the gave.
On the other hand the available French sources indicate that they had already settled for 'a thorny branch called acacia'.
We cannot be precise as to when the change began but at the Union of 1813 it was settled that acacia should be the word for ritual use and, eventually, cassia was seen no more.
