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Pomegranates.
Punica granatum. |
Autumn's first frost's split the tough
skins of the pomegranates |
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Pomegranates are believed to have originated
in Iran where they still grow wild. The fruit grows on a
hardy, long-living small tree, that depending on your
winter climate, stays green or will lose its leaves. In
Bungendore, where I live, they turn bright yellow and fall quickly when
the nights drop below 10C degrees. Alan Davidson's Oxford
Companion to Food says the fruit was well known in
ancient Egypt and that when Moses was leading the Israelites
to the Promised Land, he had to reassure them that they'd
find there the refreshing fruit they'd left behind.
... a land of brooks of water, of fountains
and depths that spring out of valleys and hills;
A land of wheat, and barley and vines, and fig trees, and
pomegranates; a land of oil olive and honey;
Deuteronomy 8,7-8.
Homer mentions pomegranates so the
ancient Greeks knew of the fruit, and the Romans seem to
have discovered it via Carthage in North Africa.
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