THE ANCIENT GREEKS used the olive as a symbol of prosperity, as here in this scene of olive-gathering by young people in an Attic black-figured neck-amphora, c.520 BCE, from Vulci. It is now in the British Museum, Cat. Vases B 226.

FOR THE ATHENIANS the olive was a symbol of Athena, who gave the tree to the city to guarantee its prosperity. Here Athena’s two symbols, the owl and the olive, fill the obverse of a silver coin of Athens, c.450 BCE. London, British Museum. Barbara McManus, 2001.

THE ROMANS associated the olive branch with victory, the Pax Romana. On the reverse of an aureus of Tiberius, c.20 CE, a seated Livia (larger version) represents Pax, holding an olive branch and a scepter. London, British Museum. Barbara McManus, 2001; 2006.

IN JEWISH TRADITION the olive branch held by the dove returning to Noah after the flood symbolized Yahweh’s reconciliation with humanity and the faithfulness of the covenant. Fresco, Catacomb of SS. Marcellino e Pietro, Rome.

FOR EARLY CHRISTIANITY the olive branch held by the dove remained the Jewish symbol of forgiveness and reconciliation but incorporated Greek and Roman notions of eternal peace. On grave markers and sarcophagi it is sometimes accompanied explicitly by the word eirene or pax, peace. View a small gallery from Sta. Maria in Trastevere, Rome.

IN LATE MEDIEVAL ITALY Ambrogio Lorenzetti combined Christian and classical meanings of peace in the most famous political allegory of all time: The Effects of Good and Bad Government (Siena, Palazzo Pubblico, 1338-40). Pax rests serenely, olive branch in hand, presiding with Justice over a well-governed and prosperous society.

IN FLANDERS AT THE SAME TIME Jacob van Maerlant made good use of the olive branch and dove in his Spiegel historiael of c.1350. From a manuscript in the Royal Dutch Academy of Arts and Sciences, Signatuur KA 20, fol. 5r b.  

DURING THE ITALIAN RENAISSANCE the olive branch was used as an attribute of the Olivetan Order, whose chief house was in Monte Oliveto in Tuscany. Founder Bernardo Tolomei (1272-1348) stands with his monks in a capital “G” (Free Library of Philadelphia c.1440). Does the branch symbolize monastic peace, the Mount of Olives, or both?

HANS MEMLING (c.1435-1494) borrowed Italian iconography to portray this angel with the olive branch, a rare occurrence in Flemish art, where the sword (justice) or the lily (mercy or peace) more often accompanied angels. Louvre Museum, Paris.

IN THE EARLY AGE OF PRINT the olive branch carried by the dove continued its medieval associations with the Ark of Noah. This example is taken from a hand-tinted woodcut in De Bibel Int Carte (Antwerp, 1516) in the Library of Congress Jewish Virtual Library.

THE ENLIGHTENMENT secularized the Judeo-Christian symbol of the olive branch and made it into an emblem of peace through military and political victory. Here William and Mary accept the olive branch from Peace in a detail from the Painted Hall Greenwich, England c. 1700.

IN THE AMERICAN COLONIAL ERA the dove with the olive branch had widespread use, on currency and other symbols of government, as on this North Carolina £2 note from 1771.

FOR THE 18TH CENTURY the olive branch continued to symbolize peace as the opposite of war. In Peace and War (1776) by Pompeo Girolamo Batoni (1708-1787), now in the Art Institute of Chicago, Peace offers the olive branch and restrains Mars’ sword.

DURING THE U.S. CIVIL WAR the popular press used Christian imagery to sacralize the Union victory. Comparing Grant with Christ, Harper’s Weekly (April 9, 1865) intoned, “Blessed are the Peacemakers.” It declared, “we hold out the olive branch to our erring and misguided brethren of the Southern States.”  Illustration by Thomas Nast.

BY 1900 the olive branch was still used to symbolize the peace brought about by military victory. Holding the olive branch, Peace soars above a grateful people in a detail of the Colonel Eli Lilly Civil War Monument in Indianapolis, completed in 1902.

MODERN INTERNATIONALISM saw the olive branch as another symbol of the system of treaties and alliances that would preserve peace as order and prevent war. This image is taken from the March 26, 1919 (vol. 156) issue of Punch Magazine.

THE OLYMPICS of 1936 offered Hitler a remarkable public-relations coup, co-opting all the symbolism of international cooperation and unity. Here he accepts the olive branch of peace from Louis Spiridon, Greek champion of the 1896 Olympics. Bundesarchiv Koblenz.

IN THE POST-WAR PERIOD the olive branch could be used as a symbol of military victory, as here in the Liberation Monument in Budapest, dating from 1947.

ON THE GREAT SEAL OF THE USA the obverse (front) shows the eagle holding both a bundle of arrows for war and the olive branch of peace. See a Wikipedia article.

THE UNITED NATIONS incorporated the double olive branch as its chief symbol of peace and reconciliation into its flag of 1947. Its iconography deliberately replaces the laurel wreath of victory and triumph, familiar on so many war monuments, with that of peace.

FROM ANCIENT EGYPT this painted limestone fragment from c.1373–1362 BCE shows Akhenaton holding an olive branch amid the rays of Aton’s grace, a clear association with divine favor. Metropolitan Museum of Art 1981.449. See Edna R. Russmann and Peter F. Dorman, “Notable Acquisitions 1981-1982” Ancient Near Eastern and Egyptian Art.”