I walk by a house with a beautiful rose bush amidst the landscaping in the front yard. There is nothing quite like the beauty and scent of a rose. Its perfume has the power to lift your spirits when feeling low and its splendor is something you never forget. They are always prettier in someone else’s yard. I have never been able to grow them myself. My grandmother once told me to put Epsom salts in the soil around rose bushes to help them grow. There were existing rose bushes in a house I moved into, so I did what she said. They all died! I just don’t have a green thumb, but I can certainly admire others’ gorgeous roses. And I certainly don’t mind receiving them. If you want to go beyond admiration of the spectacular flower, read on.
According to Wikipedia, a rose is a woody perennial flowering plant of the genus Rosa, in the family Rosaceae, or the flower it bears. There are over 300 species and tens of thousands of cultivars. They form a group of plants that can be erect shrubs, climbing, or trailing, with stems that are often armed with sharp prickles. Flowers vary in size and shape and are usually large and showy, in colors ranging from white through yellows and reds.] Most species are native to Asia, with smaller numbers native to Europe, North America and northwestern Africa. Species, cultivars and hybrids are all widely grown for their beauty and often are fragrant. Roses have acquired cultural significance in many societies. Rose plants range in size from compact, miniature roses to climbers that can reach seven meters in height. Different species hybridize easily, and this has been used in the development of the wide range of garden roses.
Botany
The flowers of most species have five petals, with the exception of Rosa sericea, which usually has only four. Each petal is divided into two distinct lobes and is usually white or pink, though in a few species yellow or red. Beneath the petals are five sepals — or in the case of some Rosa sericea, four. These may be long enough to be visible when viewed from above and appear as green points alternating with the rounded petals. There are multiple superior ovaries that develop into achenes or simple, dry fruit. Roses are insect-pollinated in nature.
The aggregate fruit of the rose is a berry-like structure called a rose hip. Many of the domestic cultivars do not produce hips, as the flowers are so tightly petalled that they do not provide access for pollination. The hips of most species are red, but a few have dark purple to black hips. Each hip comprises an outer fleshy layer, the hypanthium, which contains 5–160 "seeds" embedded in a matrix of fine, but stiff, hairs. Rose hips of some species, especially the dog rose andrugosa rose, are very rich in vitamin C, among the richest sources of any plant. The hips are eaten by fruit-eating birds such as thrushes and waxwings, which then disperse the seeds in their droppings. Some birds, particularly finches, also eat the seeds.
The sharp growths along a rose stem, though commonly called "thorns", are technically prickles, outgrowths of the epidermis — the outer layer of tissue of the stem — unlike true thorns, which are modified stems. Rose prickles are typically sickle-shaped hooks, which aid the rose in hanging onto other vegetation when growing over it. Some species have densely packed straight prickles, probably an adaptation to reduce browsing by animals, but also possibly an adaptation to trap wind-blown sand and so reduce erosion and protect their roots. Despite the presence of prickles, roses are frequently browsed by deer. A few species of roses have only vestigial prickles that have no points.
Rose perfumes are made from rose oil, which is a mixture of volatile essential oils obtained by steam distilling the crushed petals of roses. An associated product is rose water which is used for cooking, cosmetics, medicine and religious practices. The production technique originated in Persia and then spread through Arabia and India, and more recently into eastern Europe. In Bulgaria, Iran and Germany, damask roses are used. The oil is transparent pale yellow or yellow-grey in color. 'Rose Absolute' is solvent-extracted with hexane and produces a darker oil, dark yellow to orange in color. The weight of oil extracted is about 1/3,000 to 1/6,000 of the weight of the flowers; for example, about 2,000 flowers are required to produce one gram of oil.
The main constituents of rose oil are the fragrant alcohols geraniol and L-citronellol and rose camphor, an odorless solid composed of alkanes, which separates from rose oil. β-Damascenone is also a significant contributor to the scent.
Food and drink
Rose hips are occasionally made into jam, jelly, marmalade and soup or are brewed for tea, primarily for their high vitamin C content. They are also pressed and filtered to make rose hip syrup. Rose hips are also used to produce rose hip seed oil, which is used in skin products and some makeup products.
Rose water has a very distinctive flavor and is used in Middle Eastern, Persian and South Asian cuisine — especially in sweets such as Turkish delight barfi, baklava, halva, gulab jamun, kanafeh and nougat. Rose petals or flower buds are sometimes used to flavor ordinary tea or combined with other herbs to make herbal teas. A sweet preserve of rose petals called Gulkand is common in the Indian Subcontinent.
In France, there is much use of rose syrup, most commonly made from an extract of rose petals. In the Indian subcontinent, Rooh Afza, a concentrated squash made with roses, is popular, as are rose-flavored frozen desserts such as ice cream and kulfi.
Rose flowers are used as food, also usually as flavoring or to add their scent to food. Other minor uses include candied rose petals.
Rose creams — rose-flavored fondant covered in chocolate, often topped with a crystallized rose petal — are a traditional English confectionery widely available from numerous producers in the UK.
Art and symbolism
The long cultural history of the rose has led to it being used often as a symbol. In ancient Greece, the rose was closely associated with the goddess Aphrodite. In the Illiad, Aphrodite protects the body of Hector using the "immortal oil of the rose" and the archaic Greek lyric poet Ibycus praises a beautiful youth saying that Aphrodite nursed him "among rose blossoms." The second-century A.D. Greek travel writer Pausanias associates the rose with the story of Adonis and states that the rose is red because Aphrodite wounded herself on one of its thorns and stained the flower red with her blood. Book Eleven of the ancient Roman novel “The Golden Ass” by Apuleius contains a scene in which the goddess Isis, who is identified with Venus, instructs the main character, Lucius, who has been transformed into a donkey, to eat rose petals from a crown of roses worn by a priest as part of a religious procession in order to regain his humanity.
Following the Christianization of the Roman Empire, the rose became identified with the Virgin Mary. The color of the rose and the number of roses received has symbolic representation. The rose symbol eventually led to the creation of the rosary and other devotional prayers in Christianity.
Ever since the 1400s, the Franciscans have had a Crown Rosary of the Seven Joys of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In the 1400s and 1500s, the Carthusians promoted the idea of sacred mysteries associated with the rose symbol and rose gardens. Albrecht Dürer's painting “The Feast of the Rosary” (1506) depicts the Virgin Mary distributing garlands of roses to her worshippers.
Roses symbolized the Houses of York and Lancaster in a conflict known as the Wars of the Roses. The photo to the right depicts a framed print after 1908 painting by Henry Payne of the scene in the Temple Garden, where supporters of the rival factions in the Wars of the Roses pick either red or white roses.
Roses are a favored subject in art and appear in portraits, illustrations, on stamps, as ornaments or as architectural elements. The Luxembourg-born Belgian artist and botanist Pierre-Joseph Redouté is known for his detailed watercolors of flowers, particularly roses.
Henri Fantin-Latour was also a prolific painter of still life, particularly flowers including roses. The rose 'Fantin-Latour' was named after the artist.
Other impressionists including Claude Monet, Paul Cézanne and Piere-August Renoir have paintings of roses among their works.
In 1986, President Ronald Reagan signed legislation to make the rose the floral emblem of the United States.
It is the state flower of five U.S. states:
· Iowa: The wild rose was adopted as the state's flower in 1896.
· North Dakota: The wild prairie rose was adopted as the official state flower of North Dakota in 1907. The colors of the rose — green and pink — had previously been adopted by the first graduating class of the University of North Dakota in 1889.
· Georgia: The Cherokee rose was adopted as the state's official floral emblem in 1916.
· New York: In 1955, the state adopted the rose as the state flower; the legislation stated: "The rose shall be the official flower of the state in any color or combination of colors common to it."
· Oklahoma: In 2004, Oklahoma adopted a new cultivar named Oklahoma rose as state flower.
Portland, Oregon has counted "City of Roses" among its nicknames since 1888 and has held an annual Rose Festival since 1905. The city is also known for its International Rose Test Garden.
Pasadena, California – also nicknamed the "City of Roses" – has held the annual Tournament of Roses Parade since 1890, and 1902 the Parade has been held in conjunction with the Rose Bowl Game which is now played at the city's Rose Bowl stadium, built in 1922.
Spain
Catalans in northeastern Spain have traditionally celebrated Saint George’s Day (April 23) – which commemorates Saint George, the patron saint of the Catalonia region, as the "lovers' day" on which lovers exchange blood-red roses.
England
The rose is the national flower of England, a usage dating back to the English civil wars of the 15th century — later called Wars of the Roses — in which a red rose represented the House of Lancaster, and a white rose represented the House of York. The Tudor dynasty created the Tudor rose, which united both the white and the red roses, a symbolism dramatized by Shakespeare in his play Richard III. The traditional ballad "The Rose of England" recounts the seizure of the crown by the Earl of Richmond — who became Henry VII of England, the founder the Tudor dynasty — using the "red rose" as an allegory for Henry.
The England national rugby union team and Rugby Football Union adopted the red rose as their symbol in 1871, and the rose has appeared on players' kit ever since.
The red rose is the symbol for the UK Labour Party.
Shakespeare
"A rose by any other name would smell as sweet" is a popular reference to William Shakespeare's play “Romeo and Juliet, in which Juliet seems to argue that it does not matter that Romeo is from her family's rival house of Montague, that is, that he is named "Montague." The reference is often used to imply that the names of things do not affect what they really are. This formulation is, however, a paraphrase of Shakespeare's actual language. Juliet compares Romeo to a rose saying that if he were not named Romeo, he would still be handsome and be Juliet's love. This states that if he were not Romeo, then he would not be a Montague and she would be able to marry him without hinderance.
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