Скачать или смотреть Ancient Heart Jewelry- If They Don't Represent Love, Then Just What Do They Represent?

Happy Valentine's Day to all of you except for the pronunciation police and the people who can't stand me talking shit about monarchies and colonialism 💗💗💗 for this weird romantic holiday co-opted from the Saint's Day of a man who died by decapitation, I bring you one of my favorite historical anachronisms- ancient heart jewelry!

Though the heart symbol was not a representation of romantic love prior to the 13th century, the shape itself definitely predates Middle Ages Europe by many centuries, showing up in multiple ancient cultures, usually as a representation of foliage. The Greeks and Romans had many such heart shapes in their jewelry, and for them, it most likely represented the seed pod of the Silphium plant.

Now long extinct, silphium was, by all accounts, an incredibly potent aphrodisiac and contraceptive, as well as abortifacient. This usefulness is almost certainly what led to its extinction, and we are still unsure exactly what plant silphium may have been.

These beautiful ancient examples, mostly Greco-Roman and dating between 3rd century
BCE and 2nd century CE, are a testament to the importance of the silphium plant, and just how ubiquitous it was.

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