Grapes Symbols of Fertility Abundance and Prosperity

Description

Grapes are one of the oldest cultivated fruits by humans.  Wild grapes grew during the Stone Age.  The Ancient Egyptians made wine and used it for temple rituals, whereas the Ancient Greeks and Romans used wine for social drinking.  They learnt the technique of drying the grapes.  However, it was the Gauls who first put wine into wooden casks, and it was the medieval monks who became expert winemakers, pressing grapes into verjus, a sour liquid like vinegar.  The Victorians in 19th-century England cultivated grapes in hothouses, and at the same time, in France, they used a uvarium, or grape spa, to create medicinal and slimming cures from grapes. Grapes are universally recognised as symbols of fertility, abundance and prosperity (Whiteman and Mayhew, 2012, p 118).  In Spain, there is a popular tradition that involves eating exactly 12 green grapes at midnight on New Year’s Eve.  Each grape corresponds to the strikes of the clock and represents a wish for each month of the coming year to bring prosperity and ward off bad luck (www.sbs.com.au).  In Greece, traditional winemakers used to hang masks of the wine god Dionysus in their vineyards. The wind would blow the direction of the mask and was believed to foretell which vines would bear the most fruitful grapes that season (www.specialtyproduce.com).