Speaker 1: Welcome to brainstud a production of iHeartRadio, Hey Brainstuff Laura
Speaker 1: vogelbam here. Floriography, the association of flowers with special virtues
Speaker 1: and sentiments has been a practice from antiquity to the
Speaker 1: present day. Ancient Chinese flower calendars established the tradition of
Speaker 1: associating seasonal flowers with meanings, beginning in the seventh century BCE,
Speaker 1: a making January's winter flower the plum blossom, a symbol
Speaker 1: of beauty and longevity. By the seventeen hundreds, the concept
Speaker 1: of salaam, the Turkish language of flowers and objects, found
Speaker 1: its way to Europe, further establishing the idea of associating
Speaker 1: flowers with meanings. The eighteenth century religious visionary and Madman
Speaker 1: poet Christopher Smart wrote, for there is a language of flowers,
Speaker 1: for there is a sound reasoning upon all flowers, For
Speaker 1: elegant phrases are nothing but flowers. Smart's use of the
Speaker 1: terminology language of flowers is likely the earliest literary record
Speaker 1: of the informal phrase. By the early eighteen hundreds, the
Speaker 1: language of flowers was commonly recognized in Europe, and many
Speaker 1: devotees of the tradition had begun hand copying lists of
Speaker 1: flowers and their symbolic meanings. Are you a friend on
Speaker 1: the outs who wants to skip the drama of a
Speaker 1: face to face then place a lemon verbina plant on
Speaker 1: your bestie's front stoop for forgiveness. Or maybe you're a
Speaker 1: vocabulary challenged suitor who feels some kind of way present.
Speaker 1: You're someone special with the heliotrope bouquet for infatuation. Practically
Speaker 1: any emotion or black thereof, from apathy represented by Candy
Speaker 1: tuft to zeal represented by elderflower can be conveyed with
Speaker 1: a just right arrangement for the article. This episode is
Speaker 1: based on How Stuff Work. Spoke with Susan Loy, an
Speaker 1: American artist and calligrapher, whose award winning book Flowers the
Speaker 1: Angels Alphabet is a standard reference for floral dictionaries and
Speaker 1: the Victorian language of flowers. She said the idea of
Speaker 1: a symbolic language of flowers made its way to Victorian
Speaker 1: Europe and North America through a cross cultural migration of
Speaker 1: ideas and lore from China, Japan, Turkey, Greece, and Rome.
Speaker 1: The Victorian language of flowers is primarily a literary tradition
Speaker 1: that grew out of the genre of sentimental or gift
Speaker 1: flower books, which had its roots in the literary almanac,
Speaker 1: an annual publication, often a New Year's gift book that
Speaker 1: included a calendar. Literary almanacs were particularly popular around Europe
Speaker 1: and the United States from the eighteen twenties through the
Speaker 1: eighteen sixties. The language of flowers books that grew out
Speaker 1: of the tradition were sort of dictionaries of flowers, including
Speaker 1: associated meanings or sentiments, illustrations of the flowers, botanical information
Speaker 1: and lore, poetry about the flowers or those associated sentiments,
Speaker 1: and perhaps a floral calendar. Some even included a fortune
Speaker 1: telling game called a floral oracle. Modernly, lots of juicy
Speaker 1: stuff has been written about the repressive strictures of a
Speaker 1: stilted era that led daring lovers and blossoming romantic hopefuls
Speaker 1: to employ the Victorian language of flowers as a secret,
Speaker 1: encoded form of communication. Lore has it that a single
Speaker 1: flower or cryptic bouquet could express hidden desires, forbidden longings
Speaker 1: and erotic imaginings. One dare not speak out loud. During
Speaker 1: a time when etiquette loomed large over the tufted velvet
Speaker 1: love seat and decorums sucked all the oxygen out of
Speaker 1: the parlor. What claustrophobic Victorian couple wouldn't opt for a
Speaker 1: midday meander through the garden of flower dictionaries in hand.
Speaker 1: But here's the thing, Lloy explained, there is very little
Speaker 1: evidence that ordinary people in the Victorian era actually used
Speaker 1: the language of flowers as a means of communication. This
Speaker 1: is a myth that has been propagated by the writers
Speaker 1: and editors of Language of Flowers books. Artists, designers, florists, marketers,
Speaker 1: and writers are more likely to have used and continue
Speaker 1: to use floriography. Many of the Language of Flower books
Speaker 1: in my personal collection state in their introductions that Victorians
Speaker 1: used the language of flowers in their courtship, but neither
Speaker 1: historians nor I have found much evidence that they actually did.
Speaker 1: One exception is the use of language of flowers in nosegays,
Speaker 1: which originated in medieval times. During Victorian era, nosegays were
Speaker 1: called tussy mussies and sometimes included flower symbolism. From the
Speaker 1: language of Flowers, it turns out there wasn't even a
Speaker 1: single cohesive language. Alloy's research suggests that somewhere between four
Speaker 1: hundred and six hundred Language of Flowers books were published
Speaker 1: during the Victorian era. As she said, many of the
Speaker 1: writers and editors copied each other's dictionaries, so there is
Speaker 1: some agreement regarding flower meanings. Individual flower associations, however, are
Speaker 1: not universal, and there is not one lexicon of agreed
Speaker 1: upon meanings even within a single culture. As symbolic flowers
Speaker 1: and their lexicons are often tied to the geography and
Speaker 1: customs of a given region, this really only makes sense.
Speaker 1: Many of the flowers in the lexicon are wild flowers,
Speaker 1: others are garden flowers, some are florist flowers, meaning that
Speaker 1: access to specific blooms is kind of a big deal. However,
Speaker 1: there are lots of common themes like love, beauty, and friendship.
Speaker 1: Often the meanings were expressed in personal statements. For example,
Speaker 1: a sentiment expressed by Virginia Creeper was I cling to
Speaker 1: you both in sunshine and shade, or listed under peach
Speaker 1: your qualities like your charms are unequaled. There were lots
Speaker 1: of nuances. Ivy was said to symbolize friendship or lasting
Speaker 1: friendship because of its clinging habit, while periwinkle indicates early
Speaker 1: and sincere friendship. Snowdrop connotes a friend in need or
Speaker 1: a friendship inadversity, while zynia represents thoughts of absent friends.
Speaker 1: Some of the meanings have negative connotations, and the Victorian
Speaker 1: writers tended to associate these with yellow flowers, such as
Speaker 1: the daughter for meanness or a yellow rose for jealousy.
Speaker 1: Some of the writers included chapters on the special meaning
Speaker 1: assigned to the arrangement of flowers. For example, subtle signals
Speaker 1: might have been sent if a particular flower were worn
Speaker 1: in the hair or in a corsage. Lloyd said, usually
Speaker 1: the original meaning would be reversed if a flower is
Speaker 1: worn upside down. One poet and floriography maven of her day,
Speaker 1: Katherine H. Waterman Esling, wrote in eighteen thirty nine, the
Speaker 1: language of flowers has recently attracted so much attention that
Speaker 1: an acquaintance with it seems to be deemed, if not
Speaker 1: an essential part of a polite education, at least a
Speaker 1: graceful and elegant accomplishment. The long lived language of flowers
Speaker 1: craze was ushered in from eighteenth century Constantinople via Lady
Speaker 1: Mary Wortley Montague in travel letters that she mailed to
Speaker 1: her friends. In Europe. A Montague, a feminist poet who
Speaker 1: was married to the English ambassador to Turkey, accompanied her
Speaker 1: husband to his post in seventeen seventeen and became captivated
Speaker 1: by the customs there. In a letter to her friends
Speaker 1: back home, she wrote, there is no color, no flower,
Speaker 1: no weed, no fruit, herb, pebble, or feather that has
Speaker 1: not a verse belonging to it. And you may quarrel, reproach,
Speaker 1: or send letters of passion, friendship, or civility, or even
Speaker 1: of news without ever inking your fingers, Allois said. Montague's
Speaker 1: Turkish Embassy letters were published in seventeen sixty three, shortly
Speaker 1: after her death, and made her famous. The letters described
Speaker 1: Turkish life, including the salaam, the Turkish language of flowers
Speaker 1: and objects undemonic system where flowers or objects rhyme used
Speaker 1: as an aid for memorization. Examples don't translate well well
Speaker 1: because of the rhyme, but an example in English might
Speaker 1: be pair, do not despair. Although Salam is an ammonic system,
Speaker 1: it became known in Europe as a system of associating
Speaker 1: flowers with sentiments. Probably the most famous and influential floriography
Speaker 1: book is by the well known writer and illustrator of
Speaker 1: children's books, Kate Greenaway, who lived in England from eighteen
Speaker 1: forty nine to nineteen oh one. Her book The Language
Speaker 1: of Flowers, first published in eighteen eighty four, has been
Speaker 1: translated into many languages and continues to be reprinted to
Speaker 1: this day. Even if Victorian's thought and spoke about floriography
Speaker 1: more than they actually put it into practice, it's interesting
Speaker 1: to think about the movement as a pre digital version
Speaker 1: of emoji culture, Lois said. Many of the contemporary flower
Speaker 1: emoji sentiments could be found in a typical Victorian Language
Speaker 1: of Flowers dictionary. Like the Victorian Language of Flowers, flower
Speaker 1: and plant emoji symbolism often relies on a characteristic of
Speaker 1: the plant for its significance, which is to say that
Speaker 1: just as sending an emoji of a peach, chili, pepper,
Speaker 1: or eggplant doesn't literally mean that you're thinking about produce.
Speaker 1: Victorians were finding ways to express themselves figuratively. In the
Speaker 1: eighteen nineties. The Irish poet and playwright Oscar Wilde famously
Speaker 1: asked his friends and advocates to wear green carnations, which
Speaker 1: he hinted would simultaneously signify homosexuality, while meaning nothing at all.
Speaker 1: When How Stuff Works spoke with Loy back in twenty twenty,
Speaker 1: they asked her to create a hypothetical bouquet that expresses
Speaker 1: the language of flowers for our current times, and I
Speaker 1: think it's still pretty applicable. She said that she would
Speaker 1: include balm for cure, coltsfoot for justice, mint for virtue,
Speaker 1: nistertium for heroism, dogwood for honesty, oak for honor, olive
Speaker 1: for peace, pimpernel for change, pomp and rose for kindness,
Speaker 1: stuf our flower for reciprocity, time for courage, and white
Speaker 1: chrysanthemum for truth. But Lloy said this bouquet represents qualities
Speaker 1: that we need more of in our contemporary world. Today's
Speaker 1: episode is based on the article red Roses Are Yellow,
Speaker 1: Every Flower has a Secret Meaning on how Stuffworks dot Com,
Speaker 1: written by Carrie Tatreu. Brain Stuff is production by Heart
Speaker 1: Radio in partnership with how Stuffworks dot Com and is
Speaker 1: produced by Tyler Klang. For more podcasts my heart Radio,
Speaker 1: visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
Speaker 1: to your favorite shows.