The heart of Mary, meanwhile, was a rose вЂ“ except where speared with the arrows of her seven sorrows. All that syncretised neatly with Catholicism, linking back into the heart as edible fruit: the pomegranate, which represented ChristвЂ™s passion in Renaissance Europe (echoing Persephone, who also rose from the dead in spring), the grapevine that Jesus had to be (because otherwise how could his blood be wine?), even the apple that Eve tasted, discovering self-knowledge. Mexico City is founded where a magicianвЂ™s heart sprouted into a prickly pear. (The oldest known sculptural representation of the heart is a 4,000-year-old Olmec ceramic, with two chambers, sprouting blood-vessels, and a head.) Many tribal societies would eat the heart of the enemy to acquire their strength (medieval French troubadours sang of husbands serving the wife with her loverвЂ™s heart, and Mike Tyson was still threatening to eat Lennox LewisвЂ™s in 2000). In Mexico, the best-looking young Aztec men were treated as gods for a year вЂ“ fine food, musicians following them around, girls вЂ“ before their hearts were fed to the Eagle of the Sun. The ancient Egyptian god Horus weighing the heart of the dead in a balance, in an image from the 28th dynasty, dating from around 400 BC. (In another strand, the sacrament of his blood вЂ“ the love вЂ“ flowed into the Holy Grail, associating the heart with cups: вЂњ copasвЂќ was the original suit in cards which became hearts.) ChristвЂ™s heart-house, speared open on the cross, is open to us. Steps up are labelled with the virtues that must be shown in order to get there. Nuns in Germany embroidered dear little heart chalets in which Jesus receives a drink, while the lamb of God sits on the chimney вЂ“ neatly representing the aorta. A 10th-century Chinese heart sutra is written in the form of a pagoda.

In some, little Jesus sweeps demons and sins out of a heart-shaped house. They showed hearts with wings, with eyes, even being circumcised. By the 17th century, emblems вЂ“ illustrations of religious points for the illiterate вЂ“ showed a Cupid-like little Jesus playing it as a harp. It has strings вЂ“ the anatomical cordae tendinneae.

Long ago, air was believed to pass through it: in Sufi poetry itвЂ™s the reed flute, the ney. The Hindu gods Sita and Rama lived in the heart of the monkey god Hanuman 9,000 years ago. It was in love songs long before the Song of SolomonвЂ™s вЂњSet me as a seal on thy heartвЂќ. That may not have been Debbie HarryвЂ™s point, but it was her image. In the QurвЂ™an itвЂ™s made of glass, for God to see your thoughts: it must be kept clean, to reflect God back clearly. Plato described the heart as two-sided, with chambers, which is echoed in the two tablets of the Ten Commandments in the Old Testament, where law is written in the heart. Heart symbolism emerged naturally and seeped inexorably into all religions. As Hank Williams wrote centuries later: вЂњYour cheatinвЂ™ heart will tell on you.вЂќ The true heart would go west across the Nile to spend eternity eating cake with Osiris the impure heart was itself eaten, by Ammit, a chimaera of crocodile, hippo and lion. In an Egyptian poem, at least 3,000 years old, a woman says: вЂњMy heart flutters hastily when I think of my love for you it lets me not act sensibly, it leaps from its place.вЂќ Be still my beating heart вЂ¦ДЄfter death, the Egyptian heart was weighed against the Feather of Truth before a panel of deities: models of scarab beetles carried lengthy prayers beseeching the heart not to speak out against its owner. In Gilgam esh, the oldest written story, the heroвЂ™s heart beats with pride. Followed by love, courage, honesty and the rest. Imagine being stone-age: you feel it beat faster when youвЂ™re angry, scared or lustful, when you hunt you know to shoot for the heart to kill.

The heart is the only human organ other than the penis to move beyond our control, and weвЂ™ve never got over it.

Symbol for female pig