Gardens of Eden: Exotic Flora and Fauna in the Ancient Near East

"The idea of the garden began in the ancient Near East, in concert with the origins and development of agriculture,urbanism, and imperialism. From the start, exotic flora and fauna played vital roles in the world's earliest transformations of the natural environment, creating physical and metaphysical gardens of far-reaching significance. This paper examines selected aspects of exotica in Mesopotamia and Egypt, drawing together evidence from art, texts, and archaeology."