Speaker 1: Hey, and welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh, and
Speaker 1: there's Chuck. And that's all that needs mentioning today because
Speaker 1: it's just us. So this is short.
Speaker 2: Stuff, that's right. And by the way, I wanted to
Speaker 2: thank you for sending over that beautiful nosegay of wilted
Speaker 2: white roses, delivered upside down with the ribbon to the left.
Speaker 1: Well, may I ask where on your chest? Are you
Speaker 1: wearing it near my bodice in the center or right
Speaker 1: in the center?
Speaker 2: Baby?
Speaker 1: Well, I guess we're good friends. Then I can live
Speaker 1: with that. Although I'm not sure what I was saying
Speaker 1: with the whole thing.
Speaker 2: It's kind of yeah, i'd have to get out a
Speaker 2: code decoder book or whatever.
Speaker 1: Well they had those, Chuck. What we're talking about was floriography,
Speaker 1: and there were a lot of floriography books, because it
Speaker 1: turns out floriography was a huge deal in the Victorian
Speaker 1: and Regency areas. I guess between a couple of decades
Speaker 1: on either side of the nineteenth and twentieth century divide
Speaker 1: the DMZ of those centuries. As it were, this was
Speaker 1: it was really popular to send unspoken messages using flowers.
Speaker 2: That's right, unspoken because at the time in the UK
Speaker 2: and parts of the US, obviously in Europe in certain
Speaker 2: you know, high societies, mainly you could not speak these
Speaker 2: things allowed a lot of times it was untoward. So
Speaker 2: you had to have a coded way of talking to
Speaker 2: each other. And if you're thinking like, oh, yeah, you
Speaker 2: send flowers to someone and that means something, Yeah, it
Speaker 2: goes deep. I mean it is literally a code. And
Speaker 2: that's what I was kind of referring to with the
Speaker 2: upside down and the wilted and the where the ribbons tied,
Speaker 2: like all that stuff means something.
Speaker 1: It does. Yeah, it is quite deep, and you can
Speaker 1: send quite complex messages and what kind of show what
Speaker 1: we're talking about. But first I want to shout out
Speaker 1: some great sources that helped with this Farmer's Almanac. The
Speaker 1: Iowa State University Extension, Pedal Republic, it's a great name.
Speaker 1: Author Sarah on Substack, Clive Rose, Georgina Garden Center, Thursdad,
Speaker 1: just the d flower Meaning and historical Holly all help
Speaker 1: us this. So thanks to all of you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's wonderful. So this is nothing new or was
Speaker 2: nothing new back then. Coded messages through flowers goes back
Speaker 2: to the sixteen hundreds at least in the Ottoman Empire,
Speaker 2: when they had a tradition called selim or sealim se
Speaker 2: l a m, which was a game where between the
Speaker 2: members of the Harem of Constantinople, where they would send
Speaker 2: flowers attached with like rhymes and meanings and stuff like
Speaker 2: that to communicate with one another.
Speaker 1: Yeah, which made sense because a lot of them couldn't
Speaker 1: read or write, so flowers did the talking forum. And
Speaker 1: this actually spread from the Ottoman Empire to Europe via
Speaker 1: one single person, a British aristocrat who is married to
Speaker 1: the British Ambassador to Turkey. Her name was Lady Mary Wortley,
Speaker 1: and she would send back letters to friends and family
Speaker 1: describing all of the new and exotic customs of this
Speaker 1: land that she had moved to. She moved to Constantinople,
Speaker 1: and among them was a description of salam or salam selim,
Speaker 1: which how did you say it?
Speaker 2: I said, sell them or selim. I'm not sure if
Speaker 2: it's a long or shorty.
Speaker 1: Well, the flower coat that the harrm workers had come
Speaker 1: up with. She wrote a letter about that, and somebody
Speaker 1: got it and said, this is great. I want to
Speaker 1: tell everybody in the UK about it.
Speaker 2: That's right. And by the way, I mentioned a couple
Speaker 2: of puns in the Operation Paul Bunyan episode. Which one
Speaker 2: were you thinking because you said you remembered.
Speaker 1: One that the code stemmed back.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was one.
Speaker 1: That's the only one I can think of.
Speaker 2: Well, no, here's the other one. Botany was a growing field.
Speaker 1: How did I miss that pun sensor is covered with dirt?
Speaker 2: Well, no, that's good. You want to pack some mud
Speaker 2: on that thing.
Speaker 1: I know, but I don't like walking past stuff. I
Speaker 1: like to take part, you know, and be involved in
Speaker 1: the mix.
Speaker 2: So botany was a growing field, and floriography was, like
Speaker 2: I said, among certain classes, you know, mainly upper class women,
Speaker 2: because you know, it wasn't like the kind of thing
Speaker 2: that you could really talk about openly in that class.
Speaker 2: And this is one thing I haven't seen Emily yet
Speaker 2: today because she got out of the house early. But
Speaker 2: I wanted to ask her because she's, you know, like
Speaker 2: a lot of GenEx women are obsessed with Jane Austen
Speaker 2: stuff and sense and sensibility and all those series and
Speaker 2: movies and books, and I wondered if she knew about
Speaker 2: this or if they in those because I've never watched
Speaker 2: any of them, if they were kind of pointed stuff out, like, oh,
Speaker 2: he sent the flowers this way and that means this.
Speaker 1: But that's I mean, that's the Browni sisters and Jane
Speaker 1: Austin used a lot of floriography to help kind of
Speaker 1: develop their characters, which I guess, so I guess they did. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they definitely did. And the readers at the time probably
Speaker 1: would have picked up this. But floriography is it's become
Speaker 1: so arcane and obscure that modern readers would not pick
Speaker 1: up on it. But if you learn about floriography and
Speaker 1: you start reading Jane Austin, apparently it'll show up.
Speaker 2: Oh well, no, that's what I was wondering if in
Speaker 2: the books and they said, like, oh, will he sent
Speaker 2: an upside down thing which means blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, they would do that. I found a quote
Speaker 1: from Pride and Prejudice from Jane Austen.
Speaker 2: Ooh, can you read it in character?
Speaker 1: Well, it's the narrator, so sure, I guess I can,
Speaker 1: because the narrator sounds exactly like me. Yeah, but Elizabeth
Speaker 1: Bennett is giving a flower to mister Darcy, and the
Speaker 1: narrator describes she gave a red rose to tell him
Speaker 1: that she loved him Red Rose, red red red, red
Speaker 1: red Rose Rose Rose, red red Rose, red Rose, red Rose,
Speaker 1: red red red red. And then in the i think
Speaker 1: the first edition, the word red is just repeated over
Speaker 1: and over for three pages before it just stops. In
Speaker 1: a new chapter starts.
Speaker 2: That's so hot. Yeah, all right, I need to go
Speaker 2: cool down. Should we take a break?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I think so. Yeah.
Speaker 2: All right, we'll come back and tell you about a
Speaker 2: lot of this what these coated flowers mean right after this.
Speaker 1: If you want to know, then you're in luck. Just
Speaker 1: listen to h Suffus stuffus. No, so, Chuck, you mentioned
Speaker 1: that I gave you a nosegay. Another great word for
Speaker 1: a nosegay is a tuessy mussy, and floriography in the
Speaker 1: Victorian Age started to get popular at the same time
Speaker 1: that tuessy mussies and nosegays were popular too. And they're
Speaker 1: really kind of small, short, tightly bound bouquets that you
Speaker 1: would kind of wear, almost as like a booteneer or
Speaker 1: a corsage. Okay, they were made of flowers and herbs,
Speaker 1: so not just flowers, but herbs had their own meanings too,
Speaker 1: so like rosemary was for remembrance and mint was for clarity.
Speaker 1: Moss even had its own meaning charity or maternal love.
Speaker 1: Throw a violet in there, maybe for modesty. If you
Speaker 1: put all those together in a little tussy musty and
Speaker 1: gave it to somebody, you would be saying something like,
Speaker 1: I modestly ask you to clearly remember me with either
Speaker 1: charity or maternal love your pick.
Speaker 2: Yeah, which would be a very confusing message. It would
Speaker 2: be paging doctor Freud on that one, for sure. So
Speaker 2: the obviously, you know, the type of flower is gonna matter.
Speaker 2: The color of the flower is gonna matter. Many messages
Speaker 2: could be sent. If you wanted to send a message
Speaker 2: of rejection or disappointment, it could be a yellow carnation
Speaker 2: or a yellow rose. But if you send a yellow lily,
Speaker 2: that means that you're just sort of over the moon
Speaker 2: and walking on air.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Obviously, the red rose is going to mean I love
Speaker 2: you you. White rose is purity, a yellow roses loss
Speaker 2: of love, and a crimson rose is for morning with
Speaker 2: mu are right?
Speaker 1: And I mean like that is just skimming the surface.
Speaker 1: Just the color of different types of roses, right, or
Speaker 1: different color roses the state that the flowers and mattered
Speaker 1: a lot too. You may mention, I think of a
Speaker 1: withered rose in the tussy mussy I gave you. If
Speaker 1: you gave somebody just a plain white rose, you could
Speaker 1: be saying, like, I think you're heavenly, you're very pure,
Speaker 1: and I like that. But if the white rose was withered,
Speaker 1: you were telling them that they made no impression on
Speaker 1: you whatsoever, or that you think their beauty is fleeting,
Speaker 1: so remember that. And then if it was dried, you
Speaker 1: were saying, I would rather die than to give into
Speaker 1: your advances because I care about my virtue. And I'm
Speaker 1: sure you could be like, you know, if you gave
Speaker 1: somebody a withered rose, would you'd be like, is this
Speaker 1: dried or withered? What are you trying to stay? Here?
Speaker 1: So I know how much was like in the beholder's eye?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I mean translation is important, and you know
Speaker 2: we'll get to that here in a sec. But a
Speaker 2: thornless rose means you've fallen in love at first sight.
Speaker 2: Thornless crimson rose means you're mourning, because remember crimson rose
Speaker 2: this morning, but you're mourning an unrequited love at first sight.
Speaker 2: And also the context really matters like you know, you
Speaker 2: obviously kind of know what's going on between you. It's
Speaker 2: when you're getting these or you know you're you're seeking clarity,
Speaker 2: but you you know there's an established thing kind of
Speaker 2: happening here for your own context. So if you get
Speaker 2: a hydrangea, it can be thanking the receiver for understanding,
Speaker 2: or that you think they're frigid and heartless. So you
Speaker 2: really got to kind of have a read on the
Speaker 2: general air of the relationship.
Speaker 1: Yeah, same with like petunias. You could be saying you
Speaker 1: soothed me or I resent to you. So the context
Speaker 1: definitely mattered. But the reason why like hydranges and peonies
Speaker 1: and almost all of the flowers had multiple meanings was
Speaker 1: not because they needed to pull double duty because we
Speaker 1: didn't have enough flowers and enough colors. Like if you
Speaker 1: put all those together, you have a mind boggling number
Speaker 1: of combinations. So that wasn't it. The reason they had
Speaker 1: multiple meanings was because there were many, many different floriography
Speaker 1: books and essentially a lot of them just assign different
Speaker 1: meanings to different flowers. Yeah, so when you gave somebody flowers,
Speaker 1: especially if there wasn't a lot of context yet, you
Speaker 1: were just hoping that you guys were working from the
Speaker 1: same book.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, that's that's huge.
Speaker 1: I think there were ninety eight different guides just in
Speaker 1: the United States alone that were circulating from eighteen twenty
Speaker 1: seven to nineteen twenty three.
Speaker 2: Not helpful at all. And then you know, I also
Speaker 2: mentioned that they were presented upside down. That also matters.
Speaker 2: If they are upside down, that's it basically says it's
Speaker 2: opposite day. So I guess you're trying to sort of
Speaker 2: maybe confuse if like if Mum is looking on and
Speaker 2: sees these flowers, But it would seem like Mum would
Speaker 2: know about opposite day too, So I'm not really sure.
Speaker 2: You know why they would do that, Maybe to throw
Speaker 2: somebody off the scent. Who knows. How the ribbon was
Speaker 2: tied also matters. Tied to the left, it's the symbolism
Speaker 2: is applied to the giver, Right, it's tied to the
Speaker 2: right if it's in reference to the recipient.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I know, this is how deep it kits.
Speaker 1: It could also express a lot of negative meanings, and
Speaker 1: I think that's what you were doing when you handed
Speaker 1: a bouquet upside down. You'd have to be pretty sharp
Speaker 1: to put a bunch of mean flowers in and then
Speaker 1: hand it to the person upside down to let them
Speaker 1: know you meant the opposite.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but there's a lot of trouble to go through.
Speaker 1: Right there. Were Like you could be talking about jealousy
Speaker 1: with marigolds. You could be expressing distrust with lavender orange
Speaker 1: lily straight up said I hate you. You could say
Speaker 1: I feel deceived with snapdragons. You could declare war with
Speaker 1: a flower called a tansy, which I hadn't heard of before.
Speaker 1: But it's like a bunch a bunch of like small
Speaker 1: yellow flowers to get there, unlike a single stalk.
Speaker 2: Okay, I thought that might have been a misprint pansy,
Speaker 2: but I literally looked at my computer keyboard and it
Speaker 2: was like, nah, I bet it's that team the peer
Speaker 2: pretty far apart.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I just I didn't know that that flower existed,
Speaker 1: but by goodness it does.
Speaker 2: Also, accepting also mattered. So depending on which hand you
Speaker 2: accepted the flowers with sent a message, which I guess would.
Speaker 2: I mean, if you're handing them in person, you would know,
Speaker 2: but if not, you had to have it relayed back
Speaker 2: to you. Yeah, if you accepted with the right hand,
Speaker 2: it was a yes. The left hand was a no.
Speaker 2: If you held the bouquet upside down after getting it,
Speaker 2: that's rejection. If someone gave you a wisteria, maybe like
Speaker 2: asking for a dance at a dance, you would hold
Speaker 2: it upside down with your left hand if you wanted
Speaker 2: to say no, thank.
Speaker 1: You, right yeah, you were really saying I'm passing with
Speaker 1: that because you're that's a double no, although the person
Speaker 1: giving it could be like, is that a double negative?
Speaker 1: Like a yes? Is it opposite day? So you could also,
Speaker 1: as the receiver, send flowers in return too, like if
Speaker 1: somebody actually sent you flowers or a bouquet with a
Speaker 1: message and didn't physically hand it to you, you could
Speaker 1: reply with flowers yourselves. Carnations came in handy for that.
Speaker 1: If you sent a solid colored carnation, it meant yes.
Speaker 1: A yellow carnation was a big fat no. A striped
Speaker 1: carnation was letting them down a little easier, but it
Speaker 1: was still a no. It said I'm sorry, but I
Speaker 1: can't be with you.
Speaker 2: I wonder which flower meant like, you know, are you down?
Speaker 1: There was something like that out there. I guarantee you
Speaker 1: I don't know which one, Yeah, but there was definitely something.
Speaker 1: And then the last part. I asked you where you
Speaker 1: were wearing your nosegay, and you said in the center
Speaker 1: of your bodice, which meant I just want to be friends.
Speaker 1: But if you had warned over your heart, Chuck, I
Speaker 1: would have known that you were saying, I love you
Speaker 1: right back, buddy.
Speaker 2: Hey, I do love you right back, buddy. Just you know,
Speaker 2: not like that.
Speaker 1: I understand. I took my shot. Yeah, I guess, then,
Speaker 1: Chuck us short stuff is out, I think so. Stuff
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