March
2002
Did you know that
the flower of Primerose is
eaten in salads and used in jam and wine making, its leaves used as a
vegetable?
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Primula
vulgaris-acaulis (Primerose)
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Primula-Primerose
The genus Primula is commonly
known as the Primrose. Primulas are mostly hardy perennial herbs and are
natives of Europe and temperate Asia, Java and North America. The genus Primula is large and widespread with about 425 species
distributed throughout the moist and cool regions of the Northern
Hemisphere with by far the largest concentration of species being
found in the Himalayas and China. No less than 334 species grow in the
latter regions. Europe has 33 species and North America 20 species. A few species are found in the Southern
Hemisphere.
Some Primroses, such as P.
vulgaris, the English Primrose,
bear their flowers singly on stems that rise straight from the base of
the plant. Others, such as P. denticulata, P. obconica and P. elatior,
produce their clusters of flowers in a head or umbel at the top of the
flower stem. In another group, the flowers grow in an array of whorls
spaced along the upper portions of the flower stems. Some Primroses
can be grown in the rock garden, waterside or bog garden, some in the
wild or woodland garden and others are suitable for growing in flower
beds, greenhouses and gardens.
The actual origins of cultivated primulas remain forever lost in
the mists of time. From Elizabethan times complex derivatives of the
primrose (P. vulgaris) and cowslip (P. veris),
now called Polyanthus, already formed a significant
component of English knot gardens. The first double primroses were
yellow or white and coloured primroses seem to have been unknown until
ca. 1638 when P. vulgaris subsp. sibthorpii
native to from the Caucasus, Greece and Northern Iraq was introduced.
By 1648 the Oxford Botanic Garden boasted purple, blue, white and
double white varieties.
The primrose, one
of the first flowers to appear heralding the onset of spring and the
demise of winter, it never fails to gladden the heart. Its flower is
eaten in salads and used in jam and wine making, its leaves used as a
vegetable. The primrose (P. vulgaris) was used in country
medicine as it was considered an important remedy in muscular
rheumatism, paralysis and gout.
In
flower language Primula has two symbols. It is both
youth and first love, but also the representation of premature death.
They were scattered upon graves (see Shakespeare's "The Winter's
Tale"). According some legends, the primula protected
against witches and preserved cattle from illnesses. Eating a primula,
said the legend, allowed you to see fairies; and to find a primula
with petals brought luck.
Source:
http://www.botany.com/primula.html
http://www.discoveredmonton.com/devonian/getgro38.html
http://www.therepertoire.com/herbs/herbs.htm
http://www.needleworksamplers.com/Simply_Samplers/
sampler_motifs.shtml
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