Editing Pomegranate (section)

===Ancient and modern Greece===
[[Image:Hellenistic.jpg|thumb|A bronze [[Coinage of Side|coin of Side]], [[Pamphylia]], Turkey, 350–300 BC:
<br />*[[obverse]]: a [[Corinthian helmet|Crested Corinthian-helmeted]] bust of [[Athena]] right;
<br />*[[Obverse and reverse|reverse]]: a pomegranate fruit]]

A pomegranate is displayed on [[Coinage of Side|coins from Side]], as ''Side'' was the name for ''pomegranate'' in the local language, which is the city's name.<ref name="turkishodyssey">Turkish Odyssey [http://www.turkishodyssey.com/places/medit/medit3.htm Perge-Aspendus-Side-Alanya<!-- Bot generated title -->] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061114034707/http://www.turkishodyssey.com/places/medit/medit3.htm |date=14 November 2006 }} "Side was founded by Aeolians of the Aegean region. The history of the town extends back to the 7C BC. "Side" meant "pomegranate" in the local language. Until the Roman Imperial period, pomegranate was the symbol used on the coins of Side. "</ref><ref name="ma-shops/2135">{{cite web |title=Greek SIDE (Pamphylia) AE13. EF-. 1st century BC. Athena - Pomegranate. |url=https://www.ma-shops.com/an/item.php?id=2135 |website=MA-Shops |access-date=1 March 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230301032802/https://www.ma-shops.com/an/item.php?id=2135 |archive-date=1 March 2023 |language=en}}</ref><ref name="vcoins/1562290">{{cite web |title=PAMPHYLIA, SIDE. AR Stater, circa 460-410 BC. Pomegranate / Athena |url=https://www.vcoins.com/en/stores/musa_numismatic_art/193/product/pamphylia_side__ar_stater_circa_460410_bc__pomegranate__athena/1562290/Default.aspx |website=VCoins |access-date=1 March 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230301033149/https://www.vcoins.com/en/stores/musa_numismatic_art/193/product/pamphylia_side__ar_stater_circa_460410_bc__pomegranate__athena/1562290/Default.aspx |archive-date=1 March 2023 |language=en}}</ref><ref name="NumisBids/1668/1114">{{cite web |title=Numismatica Ars Classica - Auction 96 Lot 1114 |url=https://www.numisbids.com/n.php?p=lot&sid=1668&lot=1114 |website=NumisBids.com |access-date=1 March 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230301032951/https://www.numisbids.com/n.php?p=lot&sid=1668&lot=1114 |archive-date=1 March 2023 |quote=Pamphylia, Side. Stater, circa 460-430 BC, ...Pomegranate within guilloche border. Rev. Head of Athena r., wearing Corinthian helmet, hair in a queue. All within incuse square.}}</ref><ref name="wildwinds/pamphylia/side/i">
* {{cite web |title=Pamphylia, Side - Ancient Greek Coins |url=https://www.wildwinds.com/coins/greece/pamphylia/side/i.html |website=WildWinds.com |access-date=1 March 2023}}
* [https://www.wildwinds.com/coins/greece/pamphylia/side/SNGFr_772.jpg Side, Pamphylia, AE16. ca. 310-380 BC. Helmeted head of Athena right. / ΣIΔH, pomegranate on a stalk, caduceus to left. SNG France III 772; SNG Pfalz 487-488] cngcoins.com, auction 145, lot 108, Aug. 2006.
</ref> The [[ancient Greece|ancient Greek]] city of [[Side, Turkey|Side]] was in [[Pamphylia]], a former region on the southern Mediterranean coast of Asia Minor (modern-day [[Antalya province]], Turkey).<ref>{{cite book |author=Sear, David R. |title=Greek coins and their values |publisher=Seaby |location=London |year=1978 |isbn=978-0-900652-46-2 }}</ref>

The Greeks were familiar with the fruit far before it was introduced to Rome via [[Carthage]], and it figures in multiple myths and artworks.<ref>{{cite book |title=The pomegranate; Issue 276 of Bulletin |last=Hodgson |first=Robert Williard |year=1917 |publisher=California Agricultural Experiment Station |page=165 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qbgaAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA165 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160503081811/https://books.google.com/books?id=qbgaAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA165 |archive-date=3 May 2016 }}</ref> In [[Ancient Greek mythology]], the pomegranate was known as the "fruit of the dead", and believed to have sprung from the blood of [[Adonis]].<ref name="seeram" /><ref>{{cite book |title=The Greek Myths |last=Graves |first=Robert |year=1992 |publisher=Penguin Books |isbn=978-0-14-017199-0 |page=95 }}</ref>

[[File:Pomegranate (Punica granatum), Santorini (Thira), Greece.jpg|left|thumb| Pomegranate tree at [[Fira]], [[Santorini]] (Thira), [[Greece]]]]

The myth of [[Persephone]], the goddess of the [[Greek underworld|underworld]], prominently features her consumption of pomegranate seeds, requiring her to spend a certain number of months in the underworld every year. The number of seeds and therefore months vary. During the months that Persephone sits on the throne of the underworld beside her husband [[Hades]], her mother [[Demeter]] mourns and no longer gives fertility to the earth. This was an ancient Greek explanation for the [[seasons]].<ref>{{cite book|author=Ovid|title=Metamorphoses|volume=V |pages=385–571}}</ref>

According to [[Carl A. P. Ruck]] and [[Danny Staples]], the chambered pomegranate is also a surrogate for the poppy's [[opium|narcotic capsule]], with its comparable shape and chambered interior.<ref>{{cite book |author1=Staples, Danny |author2=Ruck, Carl A. P. |title=The world of classical myth: gods and goddesses, heroines and heroes |publisher=Carolina Academic Press |location=Durham, N.C. |year=1994 |isbn=978-0-89089-575-7}}</ref>

In another Greek myth, a girl named [[Side (daughter of Ictinus)|Side]] ("pomegranate") killed herself on her mother's grave to avoid suffering rape at the hands of her own father [[Ictinus (mythology)|Ictinus]]. Her blood transformed into a pomegranate tree.<ref>{{cite book | 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 | pages = 242–243}}</ref>

In the fifth century BC, [[Polykleitos|Polycleitus]] took ivory and gold to sculpt the seated [[Argive]] Hera in her temple. She held a scepter in one hand and offered a pomegranate, like a "royal [[Globus cruciger|orb]]", in the other.<ref name="theoi">{{cite web|title=Pausanias, Description of Greece|url=http://www.theoi.com/Text/Pausanias2B.html|website=2,17,4|publisher=Loeb Classical Library|access-date=30 November 2011|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111203154809/http://www.theoi.com/Text/Pausanias2B.html|archive-date=3 December 2011}}</ref> "About the pomegranate I must say nothing," whispered the traveller [[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]] in the second century, "for its story is somewhat of a holy mystery".<ref name="theoi" /> The pomegranate has a calyx shaped like a crown. In Jewish tradition, it has been seen as the original "design" for the proper crown.<ref name=PT>[http://www.bj.org/parashat_hashavua/parashat_tetzaveh_5765.php ''Parashat Tetzaveh''] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060822020510/http://www.bj.org/parashat_hashavua/parashat_tetzaveh_5765.php |date=22 August 2006 }}, Commentary by Peninnah Schram, Congregation B'nai Jeshurun, New York</ref>

Within the [[Heraion at the mouth of the Sele]], near [[Paestum]], [[Magna Graecia]], is a chapel devoted to the ''Madonna del Granato'', "Our Lady of the Pomegranate", "who by virtue of her epithet and the attribute of a pomegranate must be the Christian successor of the ancient Greek goddess Hera", observes the excavator of the [[Heraion of Samos]], Helmut Kyrieleis.<ref>Kyrieleis, Helmut. "The Heraion at Samos" in ''Greek Sanctuaries: New Approaches'', [[Nanno Marinatos]] and Robin Hägg, eds. 1993, p. 143.</ref>

In modern times, the pomegranate still holds strong symbolic meanings for the Greeks. When one buys a new home, it is conventional for a house guest to bring as a first gift a pomegranate, which is placed under/near the ''[[ikonostasi]]'' (home altar) of the house, as a symbol of abundance, fertility, and good luck. When Greeks commemorate their dead, they make ''[[koliva|kollyva]]'' as offerings, which consist of boiled wheat, mixed with sugar and decorated with pomegranate. Pomegranate decorations for the home are very common in Greece and sold in most home goods stores.<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20060111025311/http://www.christmasmagazine.com/en/spirit/xmas_greece.asp Christmas Traditions in Greece] by folklorist Thornton B. Edwards</ref>