[3][5] Salix babylonica was described and named scientifically by Carl Linnaeus in 1736, who knew the species as the pendulous-branched ("weeping") variant then recently introduced into the Clifford garden in Hartekamp in The Netherlands.

[6] Early Chinese cultivar selections include the original weeping willow, Salix babylonica 'Pendula', in which the branches and twigs are strongly pendulous, which was presumably spread along ancient trade routes.

[citation needed] Salix babylonica, especially its pendulous-branched ("weeping") form, has been introduced into many other areas, including Europe and the southeastern United States, but beyond China, it has not generally been as successfully cultivated as some of its hybrid derivatives, being sensitive to late-spring frosts.

In the more humid climates of much of Europe and eastern North America, it is susceptible to a canker disease, willow anthracnose (Marssonina salicicola), which makes infected trees very short-lived and unsightly.

By the waters of Babylon, there we sat down and wept, when we remembered Zion Despite these Biblical references to "willows", whether in Latin or English, the trees growing in Babylon along the Euphrates River in ancient Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) and named gharab in early Hebrew, are not willows (Salix) in either the modern or the classical sense, but the Euphrates poplar (Populus euphratica), with willow-like leaves on long, drooping shoots, in the related genus Populus.