Pomegranate in ancient world

Pomegranate are originated from central Asia. Pomegranate has an important place in the ancient cultures of the Mediterranean countries. It was cultivated in ancient Egypt and in early Greece and Italy. The fruit which was described by the Greek botanist Theophrastus about 2350 years before the present (BP) and is mentioned in many Greek and Turkish myths.

Edible pomegranates were firstly reported to be cultivated in Iran during 3000 BC. It was recorded that pomegranate cultivation in about 2200 B.C comes from the ancient civilization of Sumer, located in the lower Tigris and Euphrates valley, approximately the area of present-day Basra, Iraq. It is believed that the pomegranate was brought into the area by people who were migrating from the Zagros Mountains— on the present-day Iran and Iraq border.

Phoenicians established Mediterranean Sea colonies in North Africa and brought pomegranates to Tunisia and Egypt by 2000 BC. The Phoenicians were great traders who sent many ships to ports in the Mediterranean Basin.

During that time, pomegranates also naturalized around the world and reached China by 100 BC over the Silk Road.

It was probably introduced into Greece and the areas surrounding the Mediterranean Sea, as far west as Spain and Portugal by ancient sailors and traders.

Ancient traders in Central Asia and the Middle East referred to the pomegranate as the “fruit of paradise.” Arabian caravans carried the fruit with other trade goods and spices, as well as the water and food they transported to provision the travelers.

Cultivation of the pomegranates in the Roman Empire and Spain is estimated to be in 800s. It was introduced in the Indian Peninsula from Iran during the 1st century AD and was found growing in Indonesia in 1416 AD.

The Spanish sailors brought pomegranates to the New World and some missionaries introduced pomegranate in Mexico and California. The first clear evidence that the pomegranate was in the area to become the United States was in the early 1700s, when they were grown in Spanish Florida and English Georgia.
Pomegranate in ancient world

The origin of tomato

The tomato was originated in South America, in the areas surrounding the Andes Mountains, which includes parts of Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia, Chile, and Colombia. Early tomatoes were similar to cherry tomatoes today.
Presumably the cultivated species of tomato was carried from the slopes of the Andes northward into Central America and Mexico by prehistoric migration of Indians.

The Maya, an ancient civilization that live in southern Mexico between 250 AD and 950 AD were the first to cultivate the tomato plant. They called it tomatl or xtomatl.

In 1519, Spanish conquistador Hernando Cortes arrived in the Aztec capital city of Tenochtitlan, where he discovered the tomato plant. Later he presented the King of Spain with tomato seeds.

The tomato first went to Europe, where it was used as an herbal as well as being eaten as food in Italy and Spain. It was also grown for its beauty.

In 1544 and Italian herbalist, Pietro Andrae Matthioli, published a reference to ‘golden apple’, which he described as ‘flattened like the melrose and segmented, green at first and when ripe of a golden color’.

This was the first known European reference to the tomato. A decade later, Leonhart Fuchs, a German doctor, produced the first known illustration of tomatoes, a colored woodcut showing that the fruit not only arrived in Europe with golden exteriors, as Matthioli’s name suggested, but also red skin and in many different shapes and sizes.

The tomato was consumed and cultivated by some Americans during the eighteenth century in all regions of the country, including the South, the Midwest, New England, California and the American West.

Tomatoes were used as food in New Orleans as early as 1812, doubtless though French influence; but it was another 20 to 25 years before they were grown for food in the northeastern part of the country.

During the 1820s the adoption of the tomato as a culinary product increased throughout the nation. By the 1839s it was fully integrated into American cookery.
The origin of tomato

Ancient Blueberries

This berry has several names – whortleberry, bilberry, hurtleberry and cousins – saskatoons and huckleberry.

Many botanists believe a blueberry antecedent could be the most ancient living thing on earth, stepping up to the cereal bowl at the whopping 13,00 years old.

Primitive man was a hunter and a collector and one of the things they liked collecting were berries. Blueberries being chock full of antioxidants and nutrients, were a chief sources of nutrition for many ancient civilizations.

During the times of the Greeks and Romans, blueberry relatives were an important part of the daily diet.

The harvest time of blueberries since ancient times has been a time of celebration.

Indian in North America have gathered the fruit for centuries an still continues considerably to the harvest. It was them who introduced the practice of burning to control encroaching shrubs, trees and other unwanted ‘weeds’ and to kill the pests and diseases that invade the blueberry patches.

The Indians who lived on the sores of what is now called Lake Huron mixed powdered, dried berries with water, cornmeal and wild honey to make pudding, reported by observer and explorer in the early 17th century.
Ancient Blueberries