Romans used it as an ointment to heal ailments and wounds. The Jews used it to make their Kings invincible and the Christians to make chrism, an essence used for their sacred rituals that symbolizes the unity between Heaven and Earth and life and death.
The first oil classification methods date back to Roman times when, depending on the time of maturation and harvest, the product was divided into three categories:
- oleum acerbum or aestivum: obtained from the pressing of olives harvested in summer;
- oleum omphacium: produced with fruits picked in November and December;
- cibarium or maturum or romanicum: obtained by extending the harvest period until January/March.
Olive oil was a valued product in ancient Rome, so much so that the production of olives was introduced in the most remote provinces of the Empire.
Historical and archaeological evidence of the importance of the trade of olive oil can be found in the ancient Roman quarter “Testaccio”. In ‘Testaccio’ there was an ancient river port, where loads of amphorae were delivered and once emptied they were broken and deposited nearby. The remaining pieces of these containers built up a pile which was denominated ‘"mountain of shards". Because of the vast quantity and range of products put on the market, the Romans felt the need to ‘label’ their products: it was precisely in this era that traces of the first olive oil ‘label’ were found. Velabro, near the Tiber river, was one of the areas dedicated to the sale of the precious olive extract, where a temple dedicated to Ercole Olivario, patron saint of olive oil still stands. The building was commissioned by the republican oil merchant Marcus Octavius Herrenus who, at the end of the second century BC, made a fortune thanks to this valuable product.
The history of oil is one of progress: between 700 and 600 BC. the plant arrived in southern France. Since the Renaissance, the Mediterranean has become the first production center of the best oil in the world, thanks to the cultivars selected over the centuries and the increasingly refined techniques so that the oil is the pure quintessence of the sacred tree.
The millenary and charmful history of this tree is preserved, throbs and lives in today’s European oil - produced with the best cultivars and transformed with the care and attention passed on over the centuries.

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