Winter’s Flowers
Flowers for the winter months:
October – Marigold
The beautiful brightly colored October marigold is also called calendula and is known colloquially as the “sun’s bride” or “husbandmen’s dial” because its blossoms turn constantly toward the Sun. Marigold is found through Europe, the United States, and Western Asia. The Latin name for the European marigold was calendae meaning “the first day of the month” or “little calendar or little clock” because it blossomed throughout the year and provided homes, monastery gardens and church altars with a constant supply of golden blooms. The pretty golden marigold was once considered the most sacred of flowers. In India it is still reverently placed around the necks of holy statues and also sacred elephants that represent the wondrous god Ganesha. They are also strewn on temple floors and around other sacred sites. In Christian Europe, the common name for calendula was marigold which simply translates to “Mary’s gold” because they were considered the Virgin Mary’s own sacred flowers. Marigolds are good cleansers and have long been used as effective remedies for bee stings. Marigolds were also used as seasoning in the cooking pots of the poor and were also used as a substitute for saffron, adding its color to cakes, butter, and puddings. In its intimate relationship to the Sun, the marigold blossom moves and turns absorbing every ray of golden light and has come to represent the shining sun as a symbol of life itself. Thus it was believed that when one dreamed of marigolds one was looking into a future marked by prosperity and wealth. At the same time, its strange bittersweet scent has seen this lovely flower become the choice of blossom to be planted in graveyards and in this context Marigolds can also symbolize sorrow and despair, grief and misery.
November – Chrysanthemum
The name chrysanthemum is derived from two Greek words, chrysos meaning gold, and anthos meaning flower-golden flower-even though chrysanthemums come in red, white or yellow. Like the marigold, it is a perennial flower that returns year after year and blooms in late summer and fall. Native to Asia and Europe, chrysanthemums are an ancient sacred flower and were carefully cultivated as long as 2,000 years ago. The chrysanthemum flower is a powerful antiseptic and antibiotic and was used to treat high blood pressure and angina. The chrysanthemum is also a symbol of death and is brought to funerals and placed on graves. Because the flower was associated with the dead, it was also thought that the chrysanthemum had particular elements that were effective in deterring demons, and other kinds of spirits with evil intent. Depending then upon cultural perspectives and contexts the chrysanthemum may stand for compassion, friendship, abundance, beauty, and longevity, or it may symbolize forbidden love, isolation or death.
December – Narcissus
Narcissus, the Latin name for December’s flower has roots in Greek mythology where the flower’s Greek name, narkisso referred to its overpoweringly sweet and intoxicating scent. This extraordinary and sensual flower is steeped in legend and romance. The Greek God Narcissus was completely enamored of his own beauty and became so self-absorbed with his own image that he failed to recognize or acknowledge the undying love of the lovely nymph Echo. As a result she entered a cave and eventually died of grief. Unperturbed, one morning Narcissus paused to gaze at his image in a stream. He became hypnotized by his own beauty and leaned closer and closer until he fell in and drowned. The saddened Olympian gods placed Narcissus on the riverbank in remembrance of the ill-fated young deity. In this way, the narcissus blossom has become associated with vanity and death. Ancient Greeks also associated the delicate narcissus with Hades the god of the Underworld where the spirits of the dead live. In this case the blossom came to represent resurrection and rebirth because the narcissus was the flower which the young goddess Persephone was about to pick when Hades carried her to the underworld to be his wife. The world mourned her death and became all of Earth became barren until Hades relented and agreed that Persephone could walk on Earth from spring through fall. It was not until Persephone’s resurrection or rebirth that the world experienced spring again – probably some of the first blossoms that people saw when winter broke were those of the delicate and fragile narcissus.