A Brief and Concise History of the Orange and its Impact upon Human Society
The orange (
citrum sinensis) is a much unappreciated fruit common in today's society. Few today appreciate the importance of this rotund, fleshy hesperidium.
As is well known, the orange was of course invented by the Spanish in the year of our Lord 1182 AD. Following its invention by Spanish scientist and explorer, Armen The Discoverer, it was initially used for many years as a ball for playing a game that the Spanish called 'Espitradrid', very similar to modern ‘Boules’, in which the competitors took turns in rolling oranges at a large pile of rocks, with the aim being to be the first to cause the rocks to topple and squash one of the opponent’s oranges.
It was not until 1239 that a Spanish farmer (name unknown) discovered the culinary uses for the orange when a severe flood trapped him in his home, forcing him to eat a number of his household appliances before discovering this previously unsuspected usage for the orange, or ‘Espitrarange’ as it was known to sportsmen.
Soon the orange was a staple of the Spanish diet, though its tough, bitter skin proved something of an obstacle of those who wished to savour its sweet and sour interior. Spaniards were forced to tackle this obstacle with a variety of tools such as axes, hoes and longbows before finally settling on the common knife as tool of choice for this task (see figure 1). Unfortunately, this presented a range of problems to the potential orange-sampler (see figure 2 for examples).
In the year 1492, English explorer and hero, Sir James Fiennes, made a daring encroachment into the hostile country of Spain and returned with a number of these sour staples.
These fruits seemed to confuse the English people who failed to grasp the point and purpose of the cultivated berry in question. This is evidenced by the statement of King Henry VII, the reigning monarch of England, who is quoted as saying,
:
“Thus Orange seemeth to mine royal personage to lack any sense of order or necessity. The taste, while sharp and pleasant, hardly seems worth the botheration of extruding its edible centre from the outer skin. Andst the colour of the fruith art most disconcerting, being neither redd nor yellowe. One feels that a new word must be envisaged to express the appearance of this most inexplicable of fruiths.”
King Henry, perhaps not in his most creative mood, eventually settled for naming his new colour ‘rellowe’, which it remained for several centuries to follow.
Further evidence of the English population’s inability to understand the orange comes from a rare, early draft of William Shakespeare’s ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’, written in 1594, more than a century after King Henry VII’s observations were recorded. Quoting from surviving texts of the play:
:
Bottom: One must confess one feels most out of mineself, as if thus most pale moon hadst passed thrice over mine visage and with it taken both ones senses of direction andst ones fondest ability to speak without unrelenting bewilderment.
Ophelia: Thou art most strange, good sir Bottom. Thy remarkable behaviour reminds one most spuriously of the orange, with itst unfathomable skin andst itst disconcerting rellowe colouration. I find mineself most unwilling to continue in the sharing of thou company.
Ophelia exuent
The orange finally found a place in the hearts and minds of the English when the beloved Queen Elizabeth I took a liking to the fruit, following Sir Francis Drake’s amazing and revolutionary discovery of a much easier way of breaking through the skin of the orange. Sir Francis Drake used his discovery to defeat the Spanish Armada in 1598 when he outfitted his ships with stocks of oranges and had the crews eat the oranges without the use of any tools. The Spanish sailors were so terrified by this unexpected sight that they immediately fled the scene of battle. (See Figure 3 for a depiction of these events.)
Queen Elizabeth I, as mentioned, was so pleased by this result that she herself soon became an avid orange eater and so the fruit spread into the hearts of the British nation, where it has remained even to this day.
Now, perhaps, the next time you happen to spot an orange sitting casually in a fruit bowl or on a supermarket shelf, you will not merely think ‘My, what an interesting looking hesperidium,’ but will stop and consider that were it not for the orange, the world would be a much poorer place to live in.
This informative blog brought to you by Almighty Talps’ productions.
