Olive oil is an oil obtained from the olive, Olea europaea, in the family of Oleaceae, a native tree of the Mediterranean region. In Latin is “oliva” an in Greek “elaia.”
In the botanical world, the olive tree is in the same class of peach, nectarine and plum trees. At the same time it is an evergreen, that its height ranges from 10 to 45 feet. Its leaves are deep green on the top side and silver on the bottom side.
For the Greeks, this evergreen was not just only a food. Olives andolive oil were their only source of dietary fat, their body care products, fuel for their lamps and so many other uses.
Olive oil was mystical, magical and medicinal. Extra virgin olive oil is a great natural medicine.
The olive trees bloom at the late spring, and have two kinds of flowers: The perfect flower, which has both male and female parts and turns into the olive fruit; and the male flower, which has only pollen producing parts.
The pollination happens with the wind and the olives mature in about six or seven months and sometimes eight, after the flowers appear.
The olive tree is one of the strongest trees on earth and lives for a couple thousand years and three at times.
In Greece and Italy has been a very serious problem with the very old olive trees. These trees are being dug up and delivered to the properties of unscrupulous buyers. The very sad thing about this, is that most of these trees can not survive the trauma.