January 9th: Apricot Day

January 9th is Apricot Day, so to celebrate here are 10 things you may not know about apricots:

1. The Latin name for the apricot is Prunus armeniaca. The word apricot is derived from the Latin word Praecocia, meaning "precious" or "early ripening".
2. Generally assumed to have originated in Armenia, as it has been grown there since ancient times, although some scientists have theorised that it came from India or China, and would have been introduced to Europe via the "Silk Road" trading route.
3. Alexander the Great is said to have introduced apricots to Greece.
4. Cultivators have produced a "black apricot", which is actually a hybrid of an apricot and a plum.
5. In Shakespeare's time, Apricots were considered to be an aphrodisiac, and were used as such in his play A Midsummer Night's Dream. In Australia, Aborigines believed the same thing, and made tea from the seeds to spice up their love lives.
6. It is said that Confucious taught his students in a forum inside an apricot wood, and so the Chinese word for an educational circle translates literally as "apricot altar".
7. Apricot kernels are believed by many to be a cure for cancer, although this has not been proven; it is also believed they are poisonous, and they do in fact contain traces of cyanide.
8. There is a superstition among US soldiers that it is unlucky to eat apricots in a tank, or even to say the word "apricot", as they believed the vehicles would break down around cans of apricots! However, dreaming about apricots is believed to be lucky.
9. In Greek mythology, it is believed that the golden apples of Hesperides which Hercules was sent to pick as the 11th of his 12 labours, were apricots, not apples. The Greeks also believed that apricot juice was "the nectar of the gods".
10. According to Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, an "Irish Apricot" is a potato!