the olive blog

Olive grower and artist

English olive grower and artist Anne Welch, based on the Greek Island of Lesbos, dropped by the olive blog.  Anne's website is here with a gallery of her work.

Amphorae

the olive blog visited the British Museum this weekend. Here are few amphorae from their collection and a description of their use in transporting olive oil and wine.

Bonsai Olive Trees II

Following yesterday's post on the olive blog in Cahors here are some further pictures of the bonsai olive tree and some of the other varieties featured at the exhibition.

Bonsai Olive Trees

the olive blog has been on tour to the beautiful city of Cahors. There was a Bonsai exhibition in the Cloister of the Cathedral St Etienne. Among the trees was this 15 to 20 year olive tree.  tob will post some more spaps of the tree and cloisters in the next day or so.

Olive Oil Lamps

Recently the olive blog posted on Lehman's olive oil lamps. Wiki has a useful reference page on oil lamps with an section on olive oil lamps. The photographs below: Modern replica of antique oil lamp and  Replica of an antique Roman oil lamp, with Christian symbol are from Rama. The light given off by these olive oil lamps is significantly brighter than candles but less than kerosene lamps and so forth which replaced them in widespread use in the nineteenth century. Wiki has an ancient roman lamps here and the photograph of a lamp depicting Pegasus is by Filip Stankov. There is a large collection of fakes and reproduction lamps at this site and links to Museum collections.

Historic Olive Oil Labels

Mark Wickens is a Canadian based collector of olive oil labels. His online gallery collection can be found here and here as well as an article, by him, on the subject. He reports that he has 1300 olive oil labels in his collection, with the oldest he has seen dating from around 1860 and which was used by the supplier to Napoleon IV. The earliest Italian label he has seen dates from 1899 though they would have been widely in use there and elsewhere.  the olive blog recalls an extensive collection of South Australian olive oil labels from the 1800s but it could not be readily googled.

Readers of the olive blog are invited to post a comment if they have seen an older label or have sites with historic labels.

Light my fire

Everything old is new again.  Or so it seems looking at these olive oil lamps from Lehmans. Founded by Jay Lehman in 1955 to serve the local Amish and others without electricity, Lehman's ships old-fashioned, high-quality merchandise all over the world.  Their pitch is that olive oil is 99 pure renewable fuel, produces no smoke or odor and can't aggravate allergies or catch on fire if tipped over. They also sell a kit for making your own lamps and a book on lamp making.

 

Archaeological Museum in Athens and Antimenes

The Archaeological museum is well worth a visit while in Athens.

The Minoan vase with the Octopus design below caught the attention of the olive blog .

Perhaps the most famous vase with olive trees is by Antimenes (circa 530-510 BC) showing an olive harvest.  The Olive Harvest Vase is apparently held in the British Museum in London.

Athens and Olives VIII

A shift in subject in this series of posts to some of the museums in Athens.  Here are a few snaps from the Museum of Cycladic art   A couple of photographs from the entrance hall and gift shop (the olive trees and horrendously expensive oil cans).  And some of the ancient pottery upstairs in the Museum.     

Flickr olive and olive oil photographs

the olive blog has posted on Flikr before recommending the photographs and creativity of its members. This time around some links to relevant groups on Flickr. Oliveworld and the as yet smaller Olives and Olive trees both contain some terrific shots. Oliveworld has 90 members and 208 photos to date while Olives and Olive Trees has 10 members and 98 photos.  Some of the best snaps of trees are by dirtydingus grouped here.