guinea melon n Also guinea watermelon S Atl, Gulf States
Usu a small, sweet, late-ripening variety of watermelon n, but occas the similar-appearing (but unpalatable) citron melon n 2.
1891 Columbus Enquirer–Sun (GA) 11 Sept [3]/2, The [turkey] hens made nests about seventy-five yards apart in Mr. Grier’s melon patch. . . The gobbler . . . got an equal distance between the two turkey hens, squatted over a guinea watermelon and set for six weeks before he was discovered. 1903 Era Mag. 12.475 TN, In the shadow of that oak, half hid in the frost-bitten weeds, you find a little striped water melon—a guinea melon, as the darkies call it—a kind of a volunteer melon that grows in the cotton every year, the first seeds of which were brought by some Guinea negro. . . Boy-like, you pounce upon it with a shout and soon it is laid open, as red as your first love’s lips and as sweet. 1908 DN 3.317 eAL, wGA, Guinea (water-)melon. . . A small worthless melon that grows voluntarily in cultivated fields. 1912 Atlanta Jrl. (GA) 28 Dec 3/2, A guinea melon that weighed less than seven pounds, grew in a cotton patch, ripened in December, and was said to have white meat instead of red, was brought to the Journal . . by W. H. Baer. . . “It’s not a citron, it’s a real watermelon.” A guinea watermelon, he explained, is a dwarf species that nature grows, especially for little negroes who pick out the last stray locks of cotton ’way along toward Christmas. 1920 Bamberg Herald (SC) 8 July 8/5, The crop of Tom Watsons had turned out to be what the farmers know as guinea watermelons—which, to all practical purposes is just about no melon at all. These guinea melons grow about as large as cantaloupes and are usually fit for nothing but hog food. 1935 Atlantic Mth. 156.48 nAL, By the time we’d filled our sacks we got us some guinea watermelons in the cotton patch and I busted their hearts out on a stump. Some was red-hearted and some was yaller-hearted. 1952 Hickory Daily Rec. (NC) 17 July 4/4, [Advt:] They Used To Call These “Guinea Melons.” Now They’re Ice Box Melons—Anyhow They’re Extra Good. 1954 Dadeville Rec. (AL) 30 Dec 1/1, Corbin Fuller . . had a watermelon cutting at Christmas. . . Seems that he had left a guinea melon in the field, covered with pine straw and broke it out for the occasion. 1954 PADS 21.29 SC, Guinea watermelon. . . The same as cymling, q.v. Northern and eastern region. [Ibid 25, Cymling. . . A variety of dwarf watermelon found in cotton fields. It seldom grows bigger than the double fist, with seeds correspondingly small. The flesh is of a yellowish or pale pink color and far inferior in taste to the watermelon.] 1966 DARE (Qu. I26, . . Kinds of melons) Inf SC3, Guinea melons. 1978 Economic Botany 32.182 eTX, A good example in east Texas is the disappearance of two wild melons that grew in upland cotton patches. One was a small round “guinea melon,” so called because of its speckled rind. Little larger than a base-ball, it had very sweet red flesh and black seed.