The Rose

Subject: ~~The Rose~~ Sat Nov 15, 2008 2:21 am

The Rose is one of the oldest flowers known to man, and still one of the most popular. Nebuehadnezzar used them to adorn his palace and in Persia, where they were grown for their perfume oil, the petals were used to fill Sultan's mattress. In Kashmir the Moghul Emperors cultivated beautiful rose gardens and roses were strewn in the river to welcome them on their return home.

Roses later became synonymous with the worst excesses of the Roman Empire, the peasants were reduced to growing roses instead of food crops in order to satisfy the demands of their rulers. The emperors filled their swimming baths and fountains with rose-water and sat on carpets of rose petals for their feasts and orgies. Heliogabalus used to enjoy showering his guests with rose petals which tumbled down from the ceiling during the festivities.

The Rose is the flower of love. It was created by Chloris, the Greek Goddess of flowers, out of the lifeless body of a nymph which she found one day in a clearing in the woods. She asked the help of Aphrodite, the Goddess of love, who gave her beauty, Dionysus, the God of wine, added nectar to give her a sweet scent, and the three Graces gave her charm, brightness and joy. Then Zephyr, the West Wind, blew away the clouds so that Apollo, the sun God, could shine and make the flower bloom. and so the Rose was born and was immediately crowned Queen of the Flowers.

There are many legends telling how red roses got their colour. The Romans believed that Venus blushed when Jupiter caught her bathing and the White Rose turned red in her reflection. The Greek legend tells how Aphrodite and Persephone were both in love with Adonis and used to share his favours. However, when Aphrodite decided to prevent Adonis from returning to her rival in the underworld, Persephone asked Ares, the God of war, to help her. When Adonis was hunting in the woods one day, he was fatally attacked by a wild boar. Aphrodite flew to his side, scratching herself on a white rose bush in her haste. Red roses sprang up where Adonis blood had spilled and the white roses of the bush turned red in sympathy.

The early Christians made red roses the symbol for martyr's blood and white roses have always been associated with innocence and purity. The Virgin Mary is said to have put her veil to dry on a red rose bush which thereafter produced pure white flowers.

Red and white roses together mean unity in the Language of Flowers. In the Wars of the Roses, the white rose was the emblem of the house of York and red rose, that of the House of Lancaster. Shakespeare dramatised the scene in Henry VI, when each side plucked the roses in the Temple garden in London. After over thirty years of civil war the two houses were finally united by marriage and the two roses were joined to form the symbloic Tudor Rose which still appears in our heraldry today. A red and whtie damask rose has since been bred and named the York and Lancaster Rose.

The meaning of the Yellow Rose in the Language of Flowers is Decrease of love and infidelity. This may be traced back to Aisha, the favorite wife of the prophet Mohammed. He suspect her of unfaithfulness and asked the advice of the archangel Gabriel. On his return Aisha greeted him with some red roses and on the instructions of the archangel he ordered her to drop them in the river, knowing that if they changed colour his suspicions were confirmed. The roses turned yellow.

Queen Elizabeth I, known as the Virgin Queen, took the Tudor Rose as her emblem and chose 'Rosa Sine Spina' as her motto. She was known as the rose without a thorn and many of the Elizabethan poets wrote of her.

The Rose has been the national emblem of England ever since. As a nation we are famous for our roses and there is hardly a garden in the land without them. There is nothing to equal their scent and we are fortunate that the perfumers art is so sophisticated that they are able to reproduce the perfume for ourselves and our homes. But it is Shakespeare who so perfectly summarises the virtues of the rose in his sonnet.

o, how much moe doth beauty beauteous seem
By that sweet ornament which truth doth give!
The rose looks fair, but fairer we it deem
For that sweet odour which doth in it live.
The canker-blooms have full as deep a dye,
As the perfumed tincture of the roses,
Hang on such thorns, and play as wantonly
When summer's breath their masked buds discloses:
But for their virtue only is their show
They lived unwoo's and unrespected fade,
Die to themselves. Sweet roses do not so;
Of their sweet deaths are sweetest odours made.
And so of you, beauteous and lovely youth,
Whent hat shall fade, my verse distills your truth.
Sonnet liv. William Shakespeare 1564-1616

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old Time is still a-flying:
And this same flower that smiles to-day
To-morrow will be dying.
Robert Herrick 1591-1674

If Jove would give the leafy bowers
A queen for all their world of flowers,
the rose would be the choice of Jove,
And blush the queen of every grove.
Sweetest child of weeping morning,
Gem, the breast of earth adorning,
Eye of flow'rets, glow of lawns,
Bud of beauty, nursed by dawns;
Soft the soul of love it breathes,
Cypria's brow with magic wreathes;
And to Zephyr's wild caresses,
Diffuses all its verdant tresses,
Till glowing with the wanton's play,
It blushes a diviner ray
Sappho of Lesbos.c. 600bc

From the Book Language of Flowers by Sheila Pickles

~~The Rose~~

The Rose