‘The leaves are turning from green to gold and rust, the last of the fruits hang crimson and smoky blue on the trees, the pumpkin-coloured dahlias and Michaelmas daisies have collapsed like drunks across the gravel path. The garden darkens to the colour of ginger cake, here and there a shot of saffron, brilliant ochre or deepest crimson. The colours, I would guess, of the Vatican at prayer.'
— Nigel Slater on his fig tree and fruiting garden as autumn approaches.
The fig is one of the most ancient fruits we know. Sweetened under the desert sun, well before our time, they tell a humble story of feasting and famine. Evidence of Ficus Carica (the edible fig) was discovered in Neolithic sites from 5000BC— thus the fig tree is one of the first fruits to be recorded in our history. In an ancient Greece Olympians were gifted figs as it was believed that the fruit had restorative powers and symbolised prosperity and peace. They believed that figs were ‘heaven-sent’.
