Sixteenth-century tomatoes in Europe: who saw them, what did they look like, and where did they come from?

BackgroundSoon after the Spanish conquest of the Americas, the first tomatoes were presented as curiosities to the European royals and drew the attention of sixteenth-century Italian naturalists. Despite of their scientific interest in this New World crop, most Renaissance botanists did not specify where these ‘golden apples’ or ‘pomi d’oro’ came from. The debate on the first European tomatoes and their origin is often hindered by erroneous dating, botanical misidentifications and inaccessible historical sources. The discovery of a tomato specimen in the sixteenth-century ‘En Tibi herbarium’ kept at Leiden, the Netherlands led to claims that its DNA would reveal the ‘original’ taste and pest resistance of early tomatoes.MethodsRecent digitization efforts greatly facilitate research on historic botanical sources. Here we provide an overview of the ten remaining sixteenth-century tomato specimens, early descriptions and 13 illustrations. Several were never published before, revealing what these tomatoes looked like, who saw them, and where they came from.ResultsOur survey shows that the earliest tomatoes in Europe came in a much wider variety of colors, shapes and sizes than previously thought, with both simple and fasciated flowers, round and segmented fruits. Pietro Andrea Matthioli gave the first description of a tomato in 1544, and the oldest specimens were collected by Ulisse Aldrovandi and Francesco Petrollini in c. 1551 from plants grown in the Pisa botanical garden by their teacher Luca Ghini. The oldest illustrations were made in Germany in the early 1550s, but the Flemish Rembert Dodoens published the first image in 1553. The names of early tomatoes in contemporary manuscripts suggest both a Mexican and a Peruvian origin. The ‘En Tibi’ specimen was collected by Petrollini around Bologna in 1558 and thus is not the oldest extant tomato. Although only 1.2% of its DNA was readable, recent molecular research shows that the En Tibi tomato was a fully domesticated, but quite heterozygous individual and genetically close to three Mexican and two Peruvian tomato landraces. Molecular research on the other sixteenth-century tomato specimens may reveal other patterns of genetic similarity and geographic origin. Clues on the ‘historic’ taste and pest resistance of the sixteenth-century tomatoes should not be searched in their degraded DNA, but rather in those landraces in Central and South America that are genetically close to them. The indigenous farmers growing these traditional varieties should be supported to conserve these heirloom varieties in-situ.

Labor XI

The Apples of the Hesperides is the most complex and fascinating Labor of Heracles. Because it is well attested in both literary and visual sources, we can follow its evolution and transformations through the centuries from a narrative to a more symbolic representation of the myth. Heracles had to fetch the golden apples from the divine garden of the Hesperides, situated beyond the limits of the known world and assimilated in popular belief with Elysion and the Isles of the Blessed. There are two main versions of how Heracles managed to obtain the apples, equally well attested in literature and art, and apparently running parallel to each other: he either picked them himself after slaying the guarding serpent; or he was helped by the sky-bearing Titan Atlas, who fetched them for him while Heracles relieved him from the burden of heavens. In other variants, known through the iconographic tradition, Heracles either deceives or is helped by the Hesperides. Even though no sources specify that the golden apples conferred immortality or youth, their divine associations and location in the paradise-like garden of the gods relate to Heracles’ attainment of immortality and the pleasures of a blessed afterlife.

Identification of Secondary Metabolites and Proximate Analysis of Golden Apple Snails (Pomacea canaliculata L.) Meat Extract

The growth of golden apple snails is very rapid and causes losses of paddy production. Therefore snails are also called pest, especially agricultural pest. Control of golden apple snails can be done by physical hand sorting and then processed into animal feed. Based on research golden apple snails proven have good nutritional content. Efforts to use golden apples nails pets become useful things such as animal feed is a sustainable conservation. Therefore, this study aims to carry out secondary metabolites identification, proximate testing, and antioxidant content of golden apple snails as an initial reference for the basic ingredients of animal feed manufacturing. The method use is hand sorting of golden apple snails at the research location, then brought to the laboratory to carry out the process of secondary metabolites identification, proximate testing, and antioxidant analysis. The results showed a golden apple snails (Pomacea canaliculata L.) extract containing active compunds of alkaloids, flavonoids, tannins and polyphenols, steroids, and glycoside. Proximate analysis showed that golden apple snails extract had a high protein content of 40,83% compared to carbohydrates and fats. These findings suggested that golden apple snailsmeat extract has the potential to be further utilized as an alternative feed for Pangasius sp.Keywords: golden apple snails. Pangasius sp., proximate testing, secondary metabolites.

Golden Apples or Green Apples? The Effect of Entrepreneurial Creativity on Green Entrepreneurship: A Dual Pathway Model

Entrepreneurs with high creativity (i.e., golden apples) are easy to find, but entrepreneurs with green entrepreneurial intention (i.e., green apples) are rare. To explain this phenomenon, we first introduce cognitive dissonance theory to demonstrate how entrepreneurial creativity influences green entrepreneurship through two parallel mechanisms—green recognition and green disengagement. Moreover, we propose the use of green self-identity as a moderator to predict when the relationships between entrepreneurial creativity and these two mechanisms are intensified or attenuated. Through an empirical study, we surveyed 362 entrepreneurs from a local entrepreneurship association in eastern China. The results show that entrepreneurial creativity is positively associated with both green recognition and green disengagement. While green recognition strengthens green entrepreneurial intention, green disengagement weakens green entrepreneurial intention. More importantly, creative entrepreneurs with high green self-identity are more likely to engage in green recognition and, thus, promote green entrepreneurial intention. By contrast, creative entrepreneurs with low green self-identity are more willing to engage in green disengagement and, thus, inhibit green entrepreneurial intention. Finally, we discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings for entrepreneurial creativity and green entrepreneurship.

The labours and golden apples of maritime history: Large-scale national and international research projects in Greece

Over the last decades, maritime history has evolved into one of the most dynamic, self-standing disciplines among Greek historical studies. The production of books and papers that probe the multilevel human interaction with the sea has been prolific, while Greek maritime historians exhibit an ever-growing presence in the international fora. This paper argues that the roots of this unprecedented boom lie in a series of large-scale research projects funded both by international and national agencies. It underlines the common features of these schemes that formulated a methodology, or rather a ‘school’ of maritime history, and introduces to a wider audience the most significant projects that are currently underway.

New Essays on Eudora Welty, Class, and Race

Responding to work begun in the 2013 collection Eudora Welty, Whiteness, and Race that mined and deciphered the complexity of her responses to the Jim Crow South, the thirteen diverse voices of New Essays on Eudora Welty, Class, and Race deepen, reflect on, and respond to those seminal discussions. These essays freshly consider such topics as Welty’s treatment of African-American signifying in her short stories, and her attention to public street performances interacting with Jim Crow rules in her unpublished photographs. They consider her strategic adaptations of Gothic plots, black pastoral, civil war stories, haunted houses, and film noir. They frame Welty’s work with such subjects as Bob Dylan’s songwriting, the idea and history of the orphan in American, and standup comedy. They compare her handling of whiteness and race to that of other contemporary authors such as William Faulkner, Richard Wright, Toni Morrison, Chester Himes, and Alice Walker. Additionally, several discussions bring her master-work The Golden Apples and her novel Losing Battles, under-represented in the earlier conversation, into new focus. The collection as a whole will help us to understand more clearly Welty’s artistic commentary on her time and place as well as the way her vision developed in a timespan moving America towards increased social awareness. Moreover, as a group, these essays provide insight into Welty as an innovative craftswoman and modernist technician, successfully altering literary form with her frequent pointed makeovers of familiar story patterns, plots, and genres. Together they show her as a remarkable writer idiosyncratically engaging and confidently altering literary history.

Feeling in the Light

Much of Eudora Welty’s writing during the Popular Front era shows a writer with an eye turned toward black workers and their centrality in southern American life, from the ordinary everyday to major political events. Welty’s use of fear and desire reconfigures discourses about black workers, including myths of rape in the midst of Popular Front anti-lynching efforts. With the case of Scottsboro and others whispering in the background, her interrelated vignettes and short fiction engage the failures of the New Deal to address the painful occurrences of lynching and labor oppression experienced by African Americans. The Golden Apples (1949) and other short stories offer a sense of racial terror, fear, and desire —feelings that not only challenged perceptions of blackness but also questioned the role of white feminine agency.