 The first recovery of his existence dates back to 1871, when the Italian esplorer Luigi Robecchi Bricchetti noticed the plant when traversing Somalia to Bari.The bush has been named after Cordeaux, a botanic who first obtained botanical specimens in the Ogaden province (Ethiopia) which were found to be a leguminous plant belonging to a hitherto unknown genus in the "Caesalpinaceae".Afterward, Hemsley gave the plant the generic name "Cordeauxia", with the specific epithet "edulis" (edible).