The fascination with the heart symbol; if you have a girl you may just know what I am referring to. I cannot count the number of hearts featured in ZE’s drawings between the ages 3-5. She has explored the heart shape in every possible way, with any available medium. However, I can’t say I am completely innocent. Ever since she started preschool I have been writing her name with
replacing the O. I have been ridiculed by my friends for branding my girl before her second birthday.
The heart shape is an extremely prevalent symbol representing love. In the past the heart has been associated with emotions, moral, spirit and even the intellect. The word heart has long been used when referring to ones soul, while the stylized depiction of a heart is representing love. You would think the heart shape icon is driven form the actual heart inside our chest; even though you truly feel love as pains in your chest, the resemblance between the two is slim. Therefore the origin of the heart shape must come from somewhere else. One of the most intriguing suggestions goes back to the 7th century B.C. to the city-state of Cyrene. Cyrene traded the rare, now extinct, plant silphium. This plant was widely used as an ancient herbal contraceptive (means for birth control). The seedpod of the silphium was shaped exactly like the iconic heart symbol, that is why historians believe its shape of the heart have come to be associated with sexuality and love.
Ancient silver coin from Cyrene depicting a silphium seed or fruit.
