cigar

cigar, cylindrical roll of tobacco for smoking, consisting of cut tobacco filler in a binder leaf with a wrapper leaf rolled spirally around the bunch. Wrapper leaf, the most expensive leaf used in cigars, must be strong, elastic, silky in texture, and even in colour; it must have a pleasant flavour and good burning properties.

Christopher Columbus and the explorers who followed him in Cuba, Mexico, Central America, and Brazil found that the Indians of those regions smoked a long thick bundle of twisted tobacco leaves wrapped in a dried palm leaf or corn (maize) husk. A pottery vessel discovered at Uaxactún, Guatemala, dating from the 10th century ce or earlier, shows the figure of a Maya smoking a string-tied roll of tobacco leaves. The Spanish word cigarro, from which cigar is derived, probably was an adaptation of sik’ar, the Mayan term for smoking. By 1600 the cigar had been introduced into Spain, where it was a symbol of conspicuous wealth for two centuries before it was widely used in other European countries. The use of cigars in New England probably followed closely the settlement of Connecticut in 1633.

Modern cigars are described by their size and shape as follows: corona is a straight-shaped cigar with rounded top (the end placed in the mouth), about 5.5 inches (14 cm) long; petit corona, or corona chica, is about 5 inches long; tres petit corona is about 4.5 inches long; half a corona is about 3.75 inches long; Lonsdale is the same shape as a corona, about 6.5 inches long; ideales is a slender torpedo-shaped cigar, tapered at the lighting end, about 6.5 inches long; bouquet is a smaller torpedo-shaped cigar; Londres is a straight cigar about 4.75 inches long. These descriptive terms appear after the brand name. A panatela is a thin cigar open at both ends, usually about 5 inches long with a straight shape but sometimes having a shoulder, or drawn-in portion, at the mouth end; originally it had a finished top that had to be cut off before smoking. A cheroot is a thin cigar, open at both ends, usually thicker and stubbier than a panatela, and sometimes slightly tapered. The name whiff, used in Britain, refers to a small cigar, open at both ends and about 3.5 inches long.

The main colour classifications of cigars are claro (CCC), light; colorado-claro (CC), medium; colorado (C), dark; colorado-maduro (CM), very dark; and maduro (M), exceptionally dark. The last two are seldom seen in the United Kingdom or the United States. The colour of the wrapper is no indication of the strength of a cigar, but considerable care is given to the matching of colours. Good-quality cigars may be sorted into as many as 20 different shades to ensure that all cigars in a box have a uniform appearance.

Cigars should be kept in a fairly dry and warm, not hot, atmosphere at constant conditions. The temperature should be 64–67 °F (18–19 °C), with a relative humidity of about 53–57 percent.

In modern packaging, a band is placed on the cigar or printed on the protective covering, usually cellophane. The covering, applied by machine, preserves the natural humidostatic condition of the cigar. Selectors and packers, working under suitable lighting, arrange the cigars according to colour and perfection of wrapper and place them in boxes made of wood, metal, paper, or glass.