Naturalists are alarmed. Agriculturalists are charmed. Naturalists are alarmed. Hittite Law Codes specify a three shekel penalty for anyone allowing a fire to destroy an apple orchard. He then proceeds to coin a new Greek word from the Persian pairidaeza , or walled garden, later becoming the Latin paradisus , and finally the English paradise.
Agriculturalists are charmed, naturalists are alarmed.
Horace notes that Italy has nearly become one big fruit orchard and the perfect meal begins with eggs and ends with apples. Apples moved west with the rise of the Roman empire as the Romans adopted the apples and orchard skills of the Greeks and Persians before them. They proceeded to carry apples to the far reaches of the Roman Empire including continental Europe and the British Isles where previously only crab apples were known. They even created a deity of the fruit trees, the goddess Pomona. Like the Persians and the Greeks, the Romans and many cultures since have responded to the basic human longing for a time and place where men and women are free from the battle with nature for food and shelter.