Consumables

Agricultural products such as olives and grapes played a vital role in ancient culture and life. Ancients crushed grapes and collected their juices in wine presses to create wine, which was a staple of everyday life in the ancient Near East. Likewise, ancients extracted oil from olives by crushing the olives in an olive press. Olive oil could be used as fuel for lamps, cooking oil, and for anointing (Exod 25:6). The remains of olive presses survive throughout the Mediterranean world, sometimes in the hundreds where industrial production likely took place (Eitam, “Olive Oil,” 167).