Sunday, August 5, 2012

Day 198...Wolf Peaches

Day 198
While making salsa, juice and working in our garden I've heard Mark, many times, refer to the tomatoes as "Wolf Peaches"
I'd never heard this term used before I was married to him 
but wasn't surprised by his knowledge!
 He never ceases to amaze me with his knowledge of nature, in general.
 He told me about the old legends of witches using tomatoes to cast spells and how everyone used to believe they were poisonous!! 
I finally decided to do a little research on it!
Did you know that in old German folklore witches used 
plants of the Nightshade family (which includes tomatoes)
to evoke WEREWOLVES!!!
An 18th century man Carl Linnaeus knew of the legend when he gave the botanical name of 
Lycopersicon Esculentum to the tomato, which translates to 
"edible wolf peach."
I looked at a few different sites and found this particular one had the most information
where the old folklore and legends were concerned. 
It also tells a little about what the word tomato means in other languages...
If you're interested, check it out! I had fun reading it!


1 comment: