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The Olive (Olea europaea) is a species of small tree in the family Oleaceae, native to the coastal areas of the eastern
Mediterranean
Basin, from Lebanon, Syria and the maritime parts of Turkey and
northern Iran at the south end of the Caspian Sea. Its fruit, the olive, is of major
agricultural importance in the Mediterranean region as the source of olive oil.
The olive tree is an evergreen tree or shrub native to the Mediterranean, Asia and parts of Africa. It is short and squat, and rarely exceeds 8–15 meters in height. The silvery green leaves are oblong in shape, measuring 4–10 cm long and 1–3 cm wide. The trunk is typically gnarled and twisted.
The small white flowers, with ten-cleft calyx and corolla, two stamens and bifid stigma, are borne generally on the last year's wood, in racemes springing from the axils of the leaves.
The fruit is a small drupe 1–2.5 cm long, thinner-fleshed and
smaller in wild plants than in orchard cultivars. Olives are harvested at the
green stage or left to ripen to a rich purple colour (black olive). Canned black
olives may contain chemicals that turn them black
artificially.