Pomegranate late 16th century and into California by Spanish settlers in 1769. Today, it is widely cultivated throughout the Middle East and Caucasus region, north and tropical Africa, South Asia, Central Asia, the drier parts of southeast Asia, and parts of the Mediterranean Basin. It is also cultivated in parts of Arizona and California. In the 20th and 21st centuries, it has become more common in the shops and markets of Europe and the Western Hemisphere. The name pomegranate derives from medieval Latin "pōmum" "apple" and "grānātum" "seeded". Possibly stemming from the old French word for the fruit, "pomme-grenade", the pomegranate
Apple with a fruit unknown in the Middle East in biblical times is found in confusion between the Latin words "mālum" (an apple) and "mălum" (an evil), each of which is normally written "malum". The tree of the forbidden fruit is called "the tree of the knowledge of good and evil" in , and the Latin for "good and evil" is "bonum et malum". Renaissance painters may also have been influenced by the story of the golden apples in the Garden of Hesperides. As a result, in the story of Adam and Eve, the apple became a symbol for knowledge, immortality,