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Show . Ill Because eggplant and tomato both belong to the nightshade family (as does also the potato) the 16th century Frenchmen often confused the two, calling them both the French for "love-apple." "love-apple." But, 2 centuries before, an apple-of-Sodom had been described, de-scribed, which was beautiful but turned the person who ate it mad at first bite. When the closely related eggplant egg-plant reached Southern Europe, it was confused with this apple-of-Sodom and called "mad-apple" "mad-apple" while the tomato continues con-tinues to be called "pomme d'amour," love apple. Even today, in Italy, eggplant is called melanzana, changed from Mala insana which translates trans-lates to mad-apple. |