Fig-lovers' slogan: Love At Fig Sight! -- Joseph Lai : ) The medicinal value of figs was mentioned by the Assyrians nearly 5000 years ago. Remnants of fig pips and charcoals have been uncovered by archeological works in the pre-pottery Neolithic layer of Jericho dating back some 1000 BM (Before Moses). Figs have a prominent place in ancient Greek legends and myths. In one legend, the goddess Ge changed her son into a fig tree to save him from an irate Zeus. The city Sykea in Cilicia takes its name from this story, and provides the root meaning for the botanical term 'synconium'. (Greek syke: fig tree, sykon: fig)

Ayurvedic medicine derived from the Indian Banyan has been found to contain antiseptic and astringent properties, and noted for the promotion of blood clotting in wounds; an infusion of its bark also alleviates diabetes.

Indian merchants, or banias, traditionally conducted their business under this great tree (Ficus bengalensis) because they consider a contract made in its shade to be binding. Often there were so many of them as to appear a modern-day stock exchange under a single tree! It was no doubt such an extraordinary sight that greeted the visiting British traders and lead them to name the tree of the banias 'banyan' . [ Native names of banyan: Nyagrodha (Sanskrit) or Bar (Hindi)]

How big a banyan can grow? Here's an example: one 200 year-old tree covering 1.6ha at Calcutta, measured 412m circumference with 100 subsidiary trunks & 1775 proproots.

If Austin Powers is a male fig wasp, what would he say to the female wasps around him?
Answer: 'Fig me, Baby... Fig me!!' -- Joseph Lai : )
ps. He would love to know that the fruit of Ficus pumila has been used by TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine) to alleviate nocturnal ejaculation, impotence, hernia and piles.

Ficus pumila is a climber par excellence. It has roots that produce its own 'cement' for attaching itself to supporting structures. The sticky exudate is effective even on the smoothest of surfaces. Its potency comes as no surprise as Moraceae, the family to which fig belongs, is noted for the latex its members produce. Examples of by-products include rubber (from Ficus elastica) and birdlime (from various fig and non-fig species such as the wild jackfruit, Artocarpus elasticus).

Ficus carica (or Common Fig) is probably native to South-west Asia, but has been cultivated extensively in the Mediterranean and in China for its sweet fruits. In Austria and Bavaria, the figs are roasted and grounded for use as a coffee substitute or additive. It was the early Egyptians who first brought it into cultivation about 4000 BC.

The early Egyptians were also fond of growing sycamore (Ficus sycomorus), the fig of antiquity mentioned in the Talmud and the Bible. It is interchangeably spelt as sycomore. Some cultivars, for example Belami and Razi, produce parthenocarpic fruits which are favoured for their seedlessness. However sycamore figs were more esteemed as shade trees, especially in arid Middle East, and for its timber from which the Pharaohs' sarcophagi are made in Egypt. The fruit appears time and again among the food offerings in burial sites and in necklaces decorating mummies.

No caprification is needed for sycamore fig. Instead, the syconia are slashed or gashed to induce maturity and to raise the quality of the fruit. The prophet Amos (Amos 7:14) practiced the ancient method in the hill area of Palestine, and Theophrastus (372-287 BC) recorded this and other cultivation practices in his well known book 'Enquiry into Plants'. Only very recently has a scientific explanation of this practise been put forward by Prof. Jacov Galil (Tel Aviv University). He has shown that the wounded fig liberates ethylene gas, which is now well known as a fruit ripener.

The harvesting of figs is portrayed on the chapel wall of Khnum-Hotep, Egypt, 4500 years ago.

On the Origin of the Sycomore Fig in the Middle East
by J. Galil, M. Stein & A. Horovitz -

Comment: Indeed, deprived of man's help, the sycamore fig in Middle East will not develop edible fruits. The tree Jesus cursed (Matthew 21 & Mark 11) must have been a wayward sycamore fig left unattended in the village of Bethphage (literally translated as 'place of unripe figs'). It is a curious incident which up to today had many a botanists up in arms debating which particular fig species the cursed tree had been. In any case, one Professor F.F. Bruce (1970) commented that for all the show of foliage, it was a fruitless and hopeless tree. He considered it to be an acted parable: the fig tree, green but barren, spoke of the city of Jerusalem where Jesus found much religious observance, but no response to his message from God. What do you think? -- Joseph Lai : )

The tree that Zacchaeus climbed to see Jesus entering Jericho (Luke 19:4) is a sycamore fig (derived from Greek sykomoraia, Hebrew shiqmah; and Hebrew teenah: fig, fig tree).

'Tall thriving Trees confessed the fruitful Mold;
The reddening Apple ripens here to God,
Here the blue Fig with luscious Juice o'erflows,
With deeper Red the full Pomegranate glows.
The Branch here bends beneath the weighty Pear,
And verdant Olives flourish round the Year.'
- Homer (the great poet of Greece, circa 850 BC; not Bart Simpson's dad! -- Joseph Lai : ))

According to the Old Testament (Genesis 3:7), Adam and Eve used fig leaves to make themselves aprons. In more recent times, many species of figs have provided people living in the tropics with fibre for cloth. All manner of bark cloth garments have been made by Polynesian islanders, Cameroon's Baka pygmies, Dyaks of Borneo, and various other ethnic communities in the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia and Pupua New Guinea. And you know what? Worn-out bark garments can be 'recycled' simply by washing and repulping, and re-beaten to make new clothes again! That's certainly one 'cool' clothing, I must say - for the hot tropics!

Unofficial acronym for FIG - Flimsy Inner Garment; a reference to the fig leaves used by Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden! -- Joseph Lai : )

It was at the foot of a fig tree that Romus and Remulus, who founded Rome, were fed by their surrogate wolf-mother.

Looking for a name for your newborn?
Consider 'Figo' ! That's the name of a famous footballer from Portugal -- Joseph Lai : )

The French worship figs! As one deliciously hot-blooded French journalist put it, figs must 'be naughtily enjoyed'. Here's an excerpt of his fig-story (where passion evidently came before proper English grammar!):

[Whew! It sure got me imagining... and set me wondering whether the Forbidden Fruit of Eden should have been a fig and not the apple after all! -- Joseph Lai : )]

The strangling fig is honoured as the National Tree of El Salvador.

The National Geographic featured 'Borneo's Strangler Fig Trees' - a 19-page article by Harvard University biologist Tim Laman in the April 1997 issue. It is graced by a most exquisite coloured illustration by George Weiblen which depicts the remarkable partnership between the fig wasp and the fig. [Memory Bank: Not too long ago, I met George and we went 'figging' around Singapore Botanic Garden -- Joseph Lai : )]

Itchy fingers be warned! Keep your hands off any fig trees in or near the deserts of Australia, especially if you can't tell one species from another. The Desert Fig (Ficus platypoda) is regarded as a totemic tree by some tribes of desert Aborigines; anyone harming the plants could be killed!