I heart you

 I have been pondering 🤔 this week about ❤️. When should we use the icon above a like - when we really ‘love’ a post we add it or when we want to send a special message to show the person we are thinking of them or to reflect our feelings. But then I thought

why is it this shape when it looks nothing like our actual heart and how did the heart become associated with love anyway? 

Evidently it was the Greek philosophers who agreed the heart was linked to our strongest emotions, including love. Aristotle, for instance according to academics, granted it supremacy in all human processes. Passion is not only linked to love, but also temper and obsession. 

One of the earliest representations of the heart shape is on a coin found in an ancient Roman city now in modern day Libya dated 500 years or so BC. It depicted the seed of a large plant part of the fennel family, Silphium, which was thought to be  extinct until last year. Records suggest that it became extinct because it was over cultivated to meet demand owing to its use as a contraceptive 😀 In 2022 however a chap reckons he found it again in Turkey where goats love it and become sneezy and sleepy after eating it! So here endeth today’s history lesson.