| The olive tree was the first type of tree to be cultivated
by the people living along the Mediterranean basin. |
Two thousand years B.C., the Code of Hammurabi governed
the olive tree trade and prohibited, under penalty
of death, the pruning an olive tree more than two feet
per year. |
Before the olive tree was cultivated in the Iberian
Peninsula, Phoenicians supplied the peoples of modern
day Spain with olive oil in exchange for silver bars. |
Today the olive tree is cultivated beyond the Mediterranean,
in such places as California, Texas, Argentina,
Australia, South Africa and China. |
