A Passion for Fruit

Features May/June 2025

Exploring the surprisingly rich archaeological record of berries, melons…and more
© BnF, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais/Art Resource, NY
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By 7,000 years ago, people in New Guinea were cultivating bananas. Around the same time, figs in the Near East and avocados in Mesoamerica were well on their way to becoming the fruits we savor today. People across the world consume an astonishing variety of fruits. These range from the smallest edible example—a neon green sphere produced by the Asian watermeal plant that measures less than the width of a pencil tip—to the largest, the 100-pound yellowish-green jackfruit. “The fruit we eat now is a result of people experimenting extensively for thousands of years,” says archaeobotanist Erica Rowan of Royal Holloway. 

For archaeologists, evidence of ancient fruit opens unexpected pathways to understanding the past. “The seeds or pits of fruit are quite hardy and survive well in the archaeological record,” says Rowan. Studying fruit can give scholars glimpses of the ingenuity of ancient peoples—for example, some used figs preserved in honey as a source of precious calories during harsh winters. People of all eras, it seems, have coveted fruit as a welcome departure from ordinary fare. “Fruit was used as a source of sugar, nutrients, flavor, and lots of different textures,” says Rowan. “Fruit was everywhere, all the time. It has always been very important to people.”

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    Royal Fruit

    Palenque, Mexico and Pusilha, Belize

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    HIP/Art Resource, NY
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    Ancient Comfort Food

    Drumanagh, Ireland

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    Courtesy Fingal County Council
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    Original Georgia Peaches

    American Southeast

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    Allen Creative/Steve Allen/Alamy
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    The Strawberry Cure

    Northern France and England

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    Minneapolis Institute of Art/The Minnich Collection, The Ethel Morrison Van Derlip Fund, 1966
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    Funeral Fruit

    Vlasac, Serbia

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    Courtesy Dragana Filipović
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    Poisonous Picnic

    Africa

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    Courtesy Susanne Renner
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    Java’s Mystic Mangoes

    Central Java, Indonesia

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    Photo by Kassian Céphas, courtesy Universiteitsbibliotheek Leiden / Public Domain
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    Sneaking a Snack

    Sydney, Australia

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    Photograph by Jamie North, courtesy Hyde Park Barracks Collection, Museums of History NSW
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    The Cat and the Fat

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    SMB - Ägyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung/Photo: Sandra Steiß
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    The King's Throne

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    © Ministère de la Culture/Médiathèque du Patrimoine, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais/Art Resource, NY
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    Byzantine Boomtown

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    Emil Aladjem, Israel Antiquities Authority
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    Lay of the Land

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    Courtesy Médard Thiry