Olive oil in the Mediterranean – History, anthropology and economics from Antiquity to the present day

After coffee in the Mediterranean, olive oil… We are particularly pleased to present this publication, the latest fruit of the close cooperation between the “Human Sciences” Scientific Interest Group on the Mediterranean area, based in Aix-en-Provence, and our Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Marseille. Oil, a product that has long been so closely linked to the life of our port city that the old name of “Place aux huiles” (oil market) still refers to the place where these heavy barrels were loaded and unloaded on the quayside. Within the confines of our consular district, there are regions renowned for their olive groves: yesterday, Aix, which in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries produced an oil considered to be the best in the kingdom; today, La Fare-les-Oliviers… In this Palais de la Bourse, a privileged place where the economic destiny of our region is forged, where issues of interest to the many countries bordering a unifying sea are debated, it’s a pleasure, to say the least, to host such round tables, which take stock of knowledge about the present, but also the past of a sector of activity.