Editing Olive (section)

===Ancient Greece===

[[File:Antimenes Painter - ABV 270 50 - Herakles and the boar - olive gathering - Berlin AS F 1855 - 03.jpg|thumb|[[Pottery of ancient Greece|Greek vase]] showing two bearded men and a youth gathering olives from a tree, by the [[Antimenes Painter]] ({{Circa|520–510 BC}})]]

Olives are thought to have been domesticated in the third millennium BC at the latest, at which point they, along with grain and grapes, became part of [[Colin Renfrew]]'s [[Mediterranean cuisine#Triad|Mediterranean triad]] of staple crops that fueled the emergence of more complex societies.<ref name=":5">C. Renfrew, ''The Emergence of Civilisation: The Cyclades and the Aegean in The Third Millennium BC'', 1972, p.280.</ref> Olives, and especially (perfumed) olive oil, became a major export product during the Minoan and [[Mycenae]]an periods. Dutch archaeologist [[Jorrit Kelder]] proposed that the Mycenaeans sent shipments of olive oil, probably alongside live olive branches, to the court of Egyptian pharaoh [[Akhenaten]] as a diplomatic gift.<ref>{{cite news |last=Hammond |first=Norman |author-link=Norman Hammond |url=https://www.thetimes.com/travel/destinations/australasia-travel/australia/the-olive-oiled-greeces-trade-with-egypt-0p8wnmf3z5h |title=The olive oiled Greece's trade with Egypt|date=28 August 2009 |work=[[The Times]] |access-date=2025-04-02 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20250402150451/https://www.thetimes.com/travel/destinations/australasia-travel/australia/the-olive-oiled-greeces-trade-with-egypt-0p8wnmf3z5h |archive-date=2025-04-02 |url-status=live}}</ref> In Egypt, these imported olive branches may have acquired ritual meanings, as they are depicted as offerings on the wall of the [[Aten]] temple and were used in wreaths for the burial of [[Tutankhamun]]. It is likely that, as well as being used for culinary purposes, olive oil had various other purposes, including as a perfume.<ref>World Olive Encyclopedia, International Olive Oil Council, Coordinator: José Maria Rlazquez Martinez, '''pp. 24.'''</ref>

The [[Ancient Greece|ancient Greeks]] smeared olive oil on their bodies and hair as a matter of grooming and good health. Olive oil was used to anoint kings and athletes in ancient Greece. It was burnt in the sacred lamps of temples and was the "eternal flame" of the original Olympic games, whose victors were crowned with its leaves. The olive appears frequently, and often prominently, in ancient Greek literature. Homer's ''[[Odyssey]]'' (c. eighth century BC), [[Odysseus]] crawls beneath two shoots of olive that grow from a single stock,<ref>Homer, ''Odyssey'', book 5".</ref> and in the ''[[Iliad]]'', (XVII.53ff) there is a metaphoric description of a lone olive tree in the mountains by a spring; the Greeks observed that the olive rarely thrives at a distance from the sea, which in Greece invariably means up mountain slopes. Greek myth attributed to the primordial [[culture-hero]] [[Aristaeus]] the understanding of olive husbandry, along with cheese-making and beekeeping.<ref>"He learned from the [[Nymph]]ai how to curdle milk, to make bee-hives, and to cultivate olive-trees, and was the first to instruct men in these matters." ([[Diodorus Siculus]], 4.81.1).</ref> Olive was one of the woods used to fashion the most primitive Greek [[cult figure]]s, called ''[[xoanon|xoana]]'', referring to their wooden material; they were reverently preserved for centuries.<ref>Toward the end of the second century AD, the traveler [[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]] saw many such archaic cult figures.</ref>

In an archaic Athenian [[Origin myth|foundation myth]], [[Athena]] won the patronage of [[Attica]] from [[Poseidon]] with the gift of the olive. According to the fourth-century BC father of botany, [[Theophrastus]], olive trees ordinarily attained an age around 200 years,<ref>Theophrastus, ''On the Causes of Plants,'' 4.13.5. noted by Isager, Signe & Skydsgaard, Jens Erik (1992). ''Ancient Greek Agriculture, An introduction''. Routledge. p. 38. {{ISBN|0415001641}}.</ref> and he mentions that the very olive tree of Athena still grew on the [[Acropolis]]; it was still to be seen there in the second century AD,<ref>"...which is still shown in the [[Pandroseion]]" ([[pseudo-Apollodorus]], ''[[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)|Bibliotheke]]'', 3.14.1).</ref> and when [[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]] was shown it {{Circa|170 AD|lk=no}}, he reported "Legend also says that when the Persians fired Athens the olive was burnt down, but on the very day it was burnt it grew again to the height of two [[cubit]]s."<ref>Pausanias, ''Description of Greece'' 1.27.1.</ref> Because olive suckers sprout readily from the stump, and some existing olive trees are purportedly many centuries old, it is possible that the olive tree of the Acropolis dated to the Bronze Age. The olive remained sacred to Athens and its patron deity Athena, appearing on its coinage. According to another myth, [[Elaea (mythology)|Elaea]]—whose name translates to "olive"—was an accomplished athlete killed by fellow athletes out of envy; owing to her impressive achievement, Athena and [[Gaia]] turn her into an olive tree as a reward.<ref>{{cite book | page = 278 | title = Metamorphosis in Greek Myths | first = Paul M. C. | last = Forbes Irving | publisher = [[Clarendon Press]] | date = 1990 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=URvXAAAAMAAJ | isbn = 0-19-814730-9 | access-date = 2023-01-30 | archive-date = 2023-01-27 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20230127114028/https://books.google.com/books?id=URvXAAAAMAAJ | url-status = live }}</ref>

The olive and its properties were subject to early scientific and empirical observation. Theophrastus, in ''On the Causes of Plants'', states that the cultivated olive must be vegetatively propagated; indeed, the pits give rise to thorny, wild-type olives, spread far and wide by birds. He also reports how the bearing olive can be grafted on the wild olive, for which the Greeks had a separate name, ''kotinos''.<ref>Isager, Signe & Skydsgaard, Jens Erik (1992). ''Ancient Greek Agriculture, An introduction''. Routledge. p. 35. {{ISBN|0415001641}}</ref> In his ''[[Historia Plantarum (Theophrastus book)|Enquiry into Plants]]'', Theophrastus states that the olive can be propagated from a piece of the trunk, the root, a twig, or a stake.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hort |first1=Sir Arthur |title=Theophrastus Enquiry into Plants |date=1916 |publisher=William Heinemann |page=107 |url=https://archive.org/stream/enquiryintoplant01theouoft#page/106/mode/2up}}</ref> Homer described olive oil as "liquid gold", while Hippocrates (c. 460 BCE – c. 375 BCE), widely regarded as the father of medicine, considered it "the great healer".<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Clodoveo |first1=Maria Lisa |last2=Camposeo |first2=Salvatore |last3=De Gennaro |first3=Bernardo |last4=Pascuzzi |first4=Simone |last5=Roselli |first5=Luigi |date=2014-08-01 |title=In the ancient world, virgin olive oil was called "liquid gold" by Homer and "the great healer" by Hippocrates. Why has this mythic image been forgotten? |url=https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0963996914003494 |journal=Food Research International |volume=62 |pages=1062–1068 |doi=10.1016/j.foodres.2014.05.034 |issn=0963-9969}}</ref>