Where did apples come from?

Sharon continues to enjoy the apples from the little tree in her huerta, or kitchen garden. These apples, like all apples, are probably descended from the wild mountains of Tian Shan, or “Heavenly Mountains”, which straddle Kazakhstan and China.

That seems a very long way from Sharon´s small garden but Oxford University researchers claim that study of the DNA of British apples, such as Granny Smith and Cox´s Orange Pippins, confirms the theory that the first edible sweet apples on earth grew in the Tian Shan mountains, at heights of more than 6,000 feet, or 2,000 meters.

Biologist Barry Juniper, says that descendant trees of the “Garden of Eden” fruit are still growing on the high mountainsides, although they are threatened by modern development. Apparently, the DNA discovery has surprised the experts. They had thought that apples were hybrids of different fruits. Bears were thought to have assisted their spread as they love eating sweet, ripe fruit. The resulting waste products spread the seeds widely. The first cultivated fruit orchards were set up around the Persian Gulf and later soldiers of the Roman legions brought apples to Europe.

Cartagena was a Roman city for many hundreds of years and Sharon says she is now going to tell everyone that the ancestors of her little tree arrived with a legionnaire.

***