What is the origin of heart symbol?

By Bob Bankard

Well, the heart has been around as long as man has, and the heart-shaped icon that has come to represent love and adoration nearly as long as that.

Somehow, the two share nothing in common at all.

The real thing is shaped like a squishy, yellow/red football; the symbol, is… well, heart-shaped. So the question comes down, where did this shape come from, and why is it so tied to love and romance?

It’s the shape of a seed pod.

The Silphium, a type of fennel that has been extinct for over two millennia. You can see the shape of it in the coin pictured above. In a way, you could say this was probably the first time love and money were so close together.

But why was the Silphium so important that it deserved to be pictured on a coin?

Silphium only grew in a restricted area, approximately 125 miles by 35 miles, on the coastal plateaus of Kyrenaika. The Greeks believed the plant was a gift from Apollo which appeared after a heavy rain storm flooded the area at about the time the city of Kyrene was founded in the seventh century BC. Of course, there is evidence that sliphium was used much earlier in Egypt, Libya and even Greece. Silphium supposedly resisted attempts at cultivation and transplantation, which made it one of the major revenue sources contributing to Kyrenaika’s wealth. Pliny described it as “one of the most precious gift from Nature to man.” It was considered to be “worth its weight in denarii” during Roman times because of its varied medical uses and scarcity. Eventually, the harvested the plant to extinction.

And what could a seed pod possibly do to rank itself as our premiere symbol of love and romance?

Silphium was the main ingredient for the most highly effective natural birth-control medicine of its time.

Some believe that the heart symbol originates from the ancient symbol for the Roman figure Nimrod, who was worshipped as a god under the name “Baal.” In the language of the ancient Babylonians, the word “bal” meant “heart.” The similarity between this word and the name “Baal” is thought to be a significant connection between Nimrod and the modern-day heart symbol.