The earliest evidence of the Olive Tree
As far back as the Minoan civilization, which flourished in Crete and in the Aegean some 5,000 years ago, when the earliest written languages came into existence, there were already symbols for the olive tree, for olives and for olive oil. The earliest olive press in Europe, perhaps even in the world, was excavated at a Minoan site on the island of Crete. It consists of a huge stone basin with a spout. The olives were placed in there, crushed with a stone, and the oil poured out of the spout and was collected and stored in huge clay amphorae.

The Olive Tree in Antiquity
The olive remained a staple in Greece throughout antiquity, and many images of the olive harvest are depicted in the art of Classical antiquity. Olive oil had many uses in antiquity. It was used medicinally, as a salve and lotion for the skin; it was used as a cologne: herbs and other aromatic plants were steeped in oil to imbue it with their fragrance; olive oil, so valued among the ancient Greeks, was the reward given to the winner of the chariot races in the ancient Olympic games, and winning athletes were crowned with a wreath of olive branches and leaves, symbols of wisdom and peace, since time immemorial. It also was used as a lamp oil. To this day in Greece, olive oil is still used as a lamp oil, to light the votives left in church as offerings.

Olive Oil in Greek Orthodoxy
Olive oil is used symbolically in the rituals of the Greek Orthodox Church. For example, when babies are baptised they are anointed with olive oil. In some parts of the country, unbaptised children are referred to as "aladoti" or "unoiled" -unanointed. During the marriage sacrament, one of the prayers bestowed upon the newly wed couple is that their home never be without bread or oil, the two most basic foods, the two foods with which one can always find nourishment. Indeed, no home in Greece is without olive oil. During times of hardship, olive oil and dried bread have kept Greeks alive and well.

Olive Oil in Greek Folk Culture
In Greek popular culture, olive oil is no less significant. For one, so deeply rooted is olive oil in the Greek psyche, which we don't even bother qualifying it -Greeks use the generic "oil" to refer to olive oil, the way some Asian cultures use the word for rice to refer generically to food.
"To oil one's intestines" in Greek means simply to eat something nourishing. We even think olive oil endows men with extra virility -an old folk saying goes "eat oil and come over tonight".
The easiest way to emphasize the importance of olive oil to the Greeks is simply to look at the country as a whole, geographically. Greece is a small country carved up by impenetrable mountains and separated regionally by the sea. Greece is a country of islands and mountains with very little farmland. The olive tree flourishes, though, almost everywhere, with the exception of the highest mountain altitudes. Some parts of the country, indeed, are almost entirely an olive grove. The Peloponnese and Crete are the two main areas of production, for both table olives and olive oil, but in islands such as Lesvos, Corfu and elsewhere, as well as on the mainland around Delphi, the olive tree finds a comfortable home and thrives.

A Word on Olive Varieties
There are dozens of olive varieties in Greece, and by and large oil olives are different varieties than the ones cultivated to be cured as table olives. Oil olives tend to be smaller. Generally, they are harvested from the end of October, in some places through February, depending on the part of the country. The ancient Greeks considered the olive oil from unripe olives to be superior, and so do their modern heirs. We have a special name for this early harvest olive oil -agoureleo- or "unripe" oil. It is delicious and peppery and is usually the color of emeralds.

There is a wide range of taste in olive oil, and the final taste of oil is the result of many different factors, from soil and microclimate to the way in which the fruit was harvested. Because of Greece's mountainous terrain, many groves are simply carved out of the steps of mountains -akin to the way rice is grown in some parts of China. That makes for difficulty in harvesting. Machinery can't move easily over such ground. Most groves are small family owned plots of land, which means that there is an immediate connection between the farmer and his crop, and by extensions, a great amount of personal care taken to ensure the highest quality fruit. Most olives are hand picked. It is not by accident that up to 90% of Greek olive oil is extra virgin.

Olive Oil in Cooking
Greek cooking, by and large, is a simple cuisine, a cuisine whose basic tenet is that food should retain its natural integrity, should be served as close to its natural state as possible. It is not a cuisine that boasts a repertory of complicated sauces or difficult techniques. Greeks generally don't steam foods. Instead, they either roast, fry, grill or boil foods. Olive oil is used in all those applications, as well as in many others.

In Roasting:
It is used as a marinade, together with lemon juice and herbs.

In Grilling:
One of the classics of the Greek kitchen, for example, is whole fish on the grill, brushed with olive oil and lemon juice and then served with an emulsified sauce of olive oil beaten together with lemon juice until it becomes creamy and yellow.

In Frying:
Greek cooks generally do not deep fry; instead, they pan-fry, everything from fish and meats to vegetables and grains. Olive oil is often the fat of choice in the Greek skillet, and lends flavor to fried foods that is otherwise lacking when seed or other oils are used.

Raw as a Condiment
Greeks love to consume olive oil raw, especially over salads and boiled greens, or added just before serving a hearty bean or vegetable stew.

A Whole Cuisine Based on Olive Oil
There is a whole category of dishes in Greece named for olive oil. We call them "ladera", which means "oiled". Μany of these dishes are eaten during periods of fasting, before certain religious holidays, when meat and dairy products are forbidden from the diet, but they are not limited to that time of the year. The "ladera," indeed, include many summer specialties, based on fresh produce. Generally, they are vegetable and bean stews. In them, olive oil is used both as the cooking medium -to saute, say, onions and vegetables or beans before adding water or broth. At the end, raw olive oil is poured over the dish, too, as additional flavoring.

Elsewhere in the Greek Kitchen
The use of olive oil is not confined to savory dishes though. In Greece, we boast a whole array of sweets made with olive oil. By and large, these are the desserts that evolved, like the "ladera" or oil-based stews, from the need to create foods that complied with the dietary rules of fasting as dictated by the traditional, religious calendar. Today, there is still a whole array of sweets based on olive oil -as opposed to butter. They comprise specialties such as: pastries filled with nuts, or with rice, nuts and raisins, where the delicate layers of filo are lubricated not with butter but with oil; sweet breads filled with dried fruits and nuts; sweet biscuits; Greeks even fry pastries in olive oil, such as the thin dough fritters topped with nuts and honey called diples or xerotigana.