Go Tell it to the Olive Tree

 

A living historical record: the olive tree of Vouves, Greece.

The Olive Tree - A Living Record

Oldest olive tree in the world is located in Crete

"The ancient Olive Tree of Vouves (Elia Vouvon) is located in the village of Ano Vouves on the island of Crete. It is believed to be the oldest olive tree in the world which still produces highly-prized olives.

Although its exact age cannot be verified using radioisotopes as the tree’s heartwood has been lost through the centuries, scientists from the University of Crete have estimated it to be 4,000 years old. It is presumed that the tree first appeared in 1100BC, in the sub-Minoan period of Cretan history." (2020, Andriana Simos of the Greek Herald)

Meet The 4,000-Year-Old Olive Tree That Saw The Rise And Fall Of Alexander The Great’s Empire—A Biologist Explains

"Deep in the heart of Crete, where myth intertwines with natural wonder, stands the legendary olive tree of Vouves. For millennia, this 2,000-year-old ancient sentinel has silently witnessed the rise and fall of civilizations, outlasting even some of Greece’s most famous historical figures.

Olive trees have long been revered not only for their fruit and oil but also for the resilience encoded in their DNA. These trees symbolize endurance, wisdom and continuity. In a landscape where nature’s secrets are often obscured by time, the olive tree of Vouves reminds us that life can sometimes persist against all odds."

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One American Political party Attempts to Censor Natural History, a Nation's History and the History of the World

“Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right.”

“And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed—if all records told the same tale—then the lie passed into history and became truth. 'Who controls the past' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future: who controls the present controls the past."

- Excerpted from George Orwell's novel, "1984", and sourced from this sobering article.

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Trump targets 'anti-American ideology' at Smithsonian museums

"Trump has set out to radically reshape American culture, which he says has been contaminated by "woke" left-wing ideology. He has signed several orders that are intended to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programmes from the federal government - some of which led to legal challenges."

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Trump Executive Order Targets ‘Anti-American’ Content at Smithsonian

"President Donald Trump has signed an executive order on Thursday directing the Smithsonian, a federal consortium of cultural and research institutions, to eliminate “divisive” and “anti-American” content from its exhibitions and restore “monuments, memorials, statues, markers” that have been removed from public spaces since 2020.

The “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History” order gives Vice President JD Vance the authority to determine what content is “improper” at the Smithsonian Institution. A fact sheet from the White House describes the order as opposed to “anti-American ideology.”

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Unabashed Fascism': Trump Executive Order Targets 'Improper Ideology' at Smithsonian

"First Trump removes any reference of diversity from the present—now he's trying to remove it from our history," wrote one Democratic lawmaker. "You cannot erase our past and you cannot stop us from fulfilling our future."

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US orders French companies to comply with Trump's diversity ban

"American interference in the inclusion policies of French companies, along with threats of unjustified tariffs, is unacceptable," France's Ministry of Foreign Trade said in a statement sent to Reuters.

"France and Europe will defend their businesses, their consumers, and also their values," the ministry, which is under the authority of the country's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, added."

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Aphroditus - Gender in the Ancient World

"There's also a statue of Venus on Cyprus, that's bearded, shaped and dressed like a woman, with scepter and male genitals, and they conceive her as both male and female. Aristophanes calls her Aphroditus, and Laevius says: Worshiping, then, the nurturing god Venus, whether she is male or female, just as the Moon is a nurturing goddess. In his Atthis Philochorus, too, states that she is the Moon and that men sacrifice to her in women's dress, women in men's, because she is held to be both male and female."

(Continued below the jump...)

"One of the earliest surviving images from Athens is a fragment (late 4th century BC), found in the Athenian agora, of a clay mould for a terracotta figurine. The figurine would have stood about 30 cm high, represented in a style known as ἀνασυρόμενος (anasyromenos), a female lifting her dress to reveal male genitals, a gesture that was believed to have apotropaic qualities, averting evil influences and bestowing good luck.

This combination of the male and female in one divinity and being associated with the moon, both of which were considered to have fertilizing powers, was regarded as having an influence over the entire animal and vegetable creation."

- A long quote found in the Wiki article for the androgynous Greek god/goddess Aphroditus, possibly the precursor to Venus Aphrodite. Often Aphroditus is referred to as the "male Aphrodite" but this isn't exactly true. Aphroditus is physically portrayed as a hermaphrodite and/or a goddess with a phallus.

In later myths, Aphroditus became Hermaphroditus, the son of Hermes and Aphrodite.

Interestingly, statues of hermaphrodites -  specifically sleeping hermaphrodites - were all the rage amongst the elite set in those latter years of BC and they did not necessarily represent symbolic figures. The third gender had aesthetic appeal. Also, gender ambiguity was, perhaps, becoming more accepted ... and, certainly, an intriguing variation of the standard erotic forms. In any case, it remains an important example of human biological diversity celebrated in art; important in the sense that, while the ancient people were of civilizations considered more primitive than those of our 21st century world, there are presently those in America - one of the cultural beacons of the West - who remain unwilling (or unable) to wrap their collective heads around simple biological realities the ancient people came to terms with centuries upon centuries ago.

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(More text to come ..)