Leonard Plukenet illustrated a "dusty fungus from Virginia, an elegant twisted work with a coral-red stipe"[Note 1] in his 1692 Phytographia[3] that was later recognized as this species.

[4] In 1809, Christiaan Persoon provided the first modern scientific description, as Scleroderma callostoma, and suggested that the species might be distinctive enough to warrant the creation of a new genus.

[8] In the same year, Nees von Esenbeck noted Bosc's belief that the species deserved its own genus and created Mitremyces, without referencing Desvaux's prior assignment to Calostoma.

[12] He revisited the genus a decade later, describing M. cinnabarinum as a novel species,[13] but incomplete descriptions and mislabelled specimens caused confusion.

[16] In 1897, Charles Edward Burnap published a new description of C. lutescens, making a clear division between the two similar species[14] that has not been substantially revised since.

[17] The specific epithet cinnabarinum is derived from the Ancient Greek word kinnábari (κιννάβαρι), and refers to its "cinnabar-red"[18] color, like that of dragon's blood.

[14] The advent of molecular phylogenetics in the late 20th century confirmed that the order Gasteromycetales was polyphyletic because gasteroid fungi do not form a single clade.

Efforts to use nuclear and mitochondrial DNA sequencing to resolve the proper taxonomic placement of these fungi revealed that Calostoma cinnabarinum was not closely related to true puffballs, stinkhorns, most earthstars, or gasteroid agarics such as Tulostoma or Podaxis, but instead belonged within the Boletales.

This analysis confirmed that C. cinnabarinum and C. ravenelii are distinct species, and identified their closest relatives outside the genus as Gyroporus, Astraeus, and Scleroderma.

[29] A subsequent multigene (nuc-ssu, nuc-lsu, 5.8S, atp6, and mt-lsu) study redrew the Sclerodermatineae cladogram slightly, making Pisolithus the closest relatives of Calostoma.

[26] Calostoma cinnabarinum's physical dissimilarity to many other species in Boletales corresponds to a higher rate of genetic drift than average for the order.

[14] The outermost is a yellowish, translucent coating of jelly-like material 4 to 9 millimetres (0.2 to 0.4 in) thick,[38] somewhat similar to a gelatinous universal veil.

[38] Contained inside the endoperidium is the gleba, or spore mass, which is white when young but buff or yellow in older specimens.

[40] The basidia are 40–50 by 15–20 μm, broadly obovate,[16] club-shaped or sometimes cylindrical, with five to twelve spores distributed evenly[14] or irregularly[38] over the surface.

Its range extends at least as far west as Texas,[45] with possible populations in the Southwest,[17] but is most common in the Appalachian Mountains where it becomes more frequent with increasing elevation.

[47] In Central America, it is known from Belize's Chiquibul National Park,[48] the cloud forests[49] of Baja Verapaz and El Quiché[50] in Guatemala, and Panama.

[53] It has also been collected from a disjunct population in Asia, where it has been recorded from seven provinces in mainland China, mostly in the southeast,[38] including Taiwan,[39] as well as from Indonesia,[54] Japan,[55] and Jirisan in South Korea.

[59] Like all mycorrhizal fungi, C. cinnabarinum establishes a mutualistic relationship with the roots of trees, allowing the fungus to exchange minerals and amino acids extracted from the soil for fixed carbon from the host.

This association is especially beneficial to the host, as the fungus produces enzymes that mineralize organic compounds and facilitate the transfer of nutrients to the tree.

[61] Early descriptions of its habitat found it in "rather moist situations"[14] and in "damp woods",[62] and David Arora has more recently described its preference for the humid forests of the southern Appalachians.

[67] Because the fruit bodies begin development underground, they are too tough for consumption by the time they are visible,[22] and their appearance may be considered unappetizing.

[21] A study of the cultural practices of mestizo descendants of the Otomi people in Tenango de Doria, Mexico, reported that immature specimens of C. cinnabarinum, known locally as yemitas, were frequently eaten raw in the past, especially by children.

A 1986 ethnomycological study of native traditions in Veracruz identified this use of huang noono, which locals roasted, then consumed as a powder with mineral water to treat gastrointestinal distress.