The 'Nar' (pomegranate) also means sun in the Old turkish language. There is a holiday that is celebrated on the 21st of December called 'Nardugan' or Pomegranate Festival. It has to do with the solstice. The highlight of the holiday is when the pomegranate is cracked open, which is believed to revive nature and bring fertility to the earth.

The celebration of the solstice and the changing of the seasons is found in many cultures but their meaning and significance has been forgotten. In many places we still have holidays like Easter or Pentecost, but many people don't know what they are and the same is true of the above mentioned holidays. The customs remain, but the meanings disappear. The symbols remain, but many people don't know what they originally symbolized.

The pomegranate, for example, is a fruit loved and eaten by many. Here in Turkey it appears in many places as a motif. On art, textiles, ceramics, etc.

It is a very special fruit and one that is not only delicious but also good for the body. Just to mention a few: it reduces harmful cholesterol and increases good cholesterol in the blood, regulates blood pressure, improves sugar absorption, is a powerful anitoxidant, has a positive effect on depression and mood changes, menopause and, in addition to all this, it has bacteria and parasite killing properties. It's wonderful! ( this one too 😊 ) 

Although it is a little difficult to consume because it oozes red juice which is a beautiful colour but very difficult to remove from textiles, it is also suitable for dyeing textiles or other things. Not only does the juice have a beautiful colour, but the whole fruit is beautiful, not to mention the flower. No wonder so many people are inspired by this fruit. Just like the olive, there are many uses for pomegranate. It is used in sweets, syrups, cosmetics and much more.

There's a mythological story related to this (I may have mentioned it before...because I like it so much I tell it more than once 😊). In the story, a golden apple is mentioned, but I always imagine it was actually a pomegranate.

"Achilles' parents, Thetis, the sea nymph, and Peleus "forgot" to invite the goddess of strife to their wedding feast. Eris was offended that all the Greek gods were on the guest list but her. She avenged the insult in her own special way.

She threw a golden apple from the Garden of Hesperides into the crowd, which was said to read "To the most beautiful". 

The vain goddesses, of course, immediately got into a tussle to see which one of them would get the fruit. First they appealed to Zeus, but he wisely declined, leaving the decision in the hands of a Trojan mortal, Paris.

The young man could even see the goddesses bathing naked, but he dared not decide. Neither candidate was far from bribing: Hera promised him dominion over Europe and Asia, Athena offered him wisdom, but the young prince accepted the offer of Aphrodite, who gave him the love of the most beautiful woman in the world.

The beauty in question was already married, but this fact did not deter Paris: he simply snatched the beautiful Helen from under the nose of Menelaus and took her to Troy. Ancient sources give conflicting accounts of this supposedly romantic storyline: Herodotus says that she was literally kidnapped, and there are frequent depictions of the Trojan prince raping Helen.

Sappho, however, says that she was happy to leave her old life, her husband and her nine-year-old daughter behind. In the Iliad, the romantic line is fulfilled: on the night before the elopement, they became lovers of their own free will.

The elopement is said to have led to the greatest war of antiquity, with the mightiest army of the age gathering and marching beneath the walls of far-off Troy.

The love story did not have a happy ending: the most beautiful lady was disappointed in the valour of her chosen lord, who later died in battle, Troy was ravaged by fire, and Helen ended up back with Menelaus."