A Tulip’s Tale

A Tulip’s Tale

The word tulip was first mentioned in Western Europe, in the context of “Turkish Letters” of a diplomat Ogier Ghiselin de Busbercq in about 1554. This was the time of Ottomans wore typical Turkish tülbend ("muslin" or "gauze"). The correlation between turban and the Tulip flower came about because the tulip in full bloom resembled a turban. The name Tulip is derived from tulipa or tulipant, tulipe by French and tulīpa in modern Latin. 

Did you know that the Tulip can be given as the 11th wedding anniversary flower? It is said that the tulip's velvety black center represents a lover's heart, darkened by the heat of passion. 

Tulips as you well know come in various colors and each carry an important meaning:

Yellow tulips once were associated with jealousy and hopeless love. Lately however, yellow tulips have gained a sunnier disposition; it now represents hope and cheerful thoughts. You may give a yellow tulip bouquet to a good friend as a caring get-well gift. Yellow is also the color of friendship, which makes it great for a just-because floral gift.

White conveys forgiveness. White tulips are the flowers to pick for an apology bouquet. You may also include with it some chocolates as a worthwhile gesture to elicit a favorable response.

Multi-hued tulips, being the most versatile, can express varied messages to that special someone. For instance, striped tulips may symbolize a lover’s beautiful eyes, as do tulips with blotched, multicolored petals. 

Purple represents loyalty. If you want to let her know that she is your queen, choose an arrangement of purple tulips. Purple can also be used to express admiration for a loved one’s accomplishments.

Pink flowers express happiness and confidence. This makes them a very good choice when congratulating a friend on a new job or promotion. The flower meaning of pink tulips is the awakening of love. Pink tulips remind me of the lovely little girl in one of Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tales: Thumbelina.

Thumbelina is a story about a girl who is born from a tulip flower. One day this thumb-sized girl is kidnapped and was carried far, far away. When the destination was finally reached she was then forced to marry a toad. While in the Toad’s abode however, she comes upon a wounded swallow and with tender loving care, saves him. The ever so grateful swallow, fully recovered, rescues her from her harsh circumstances in return. He then takes her to the Kingdom of Flowers and there she falls in love with and marries the handsome prince of the kingdom. She lives happily ever after.

And finally, Red means perfect love and as well, evokes passion and romance. Did you know that in Persia, people give red tulips when they propose? Red tulips have the meaning of eternal love; therefore it’s an ideal choice for expressing deep affections to that someone special. 

Here’s a Turkish legend that may have contributed to this belief. As the tragic story goes, once a handsome prince named Farhad fell madly in love with a beautiful a maiden named Shirin. Capricious fate however saw to it that Shrin met her untimely demise during the digging of a new replacement well for her village. When Prince Farhad learned of this he was so overcome with grief that he rode his horse over the edge of a cliff. It's said that a scarlet tulip sprang up from each droplet of his blood, giving the red tulip the meaning "perfect love."

Then there is this legend that is told in the Netherlands.

Three knights are enamored by a beautiful girl. Each in turn proposes and presents her with a gift. One gives her a crown which indicates fame. The second one presents her with a mighty sword indicative of power. The third gives her gold which is indicative of property.

The beautiful girl remains in a quandary. As she cannot choose one over the other, she seeks the Queen of Flower’s help. She pleads with Her Majesty to change her into a flower, and being granted this request, the lovely girl is transformed into a Tulip. Here, as one can see, the crown is the flower, the sword is the leaf, and the gold is the eventual transformation to a bulb. 

One of the Greek myths is about tulips:

Once, there was a pretty girl named Tulip. One day, the god of autumn while he is about, spotted this enchanting beauty and fell deeply in love. His infatuation grew with each encounter even though she blatantly resisted his declaration of love.

When yet again chancing on her while she was picking flowers he accosted her. She in desperation ran off and sought help from the God of Virginity. Kneeling before Artemis, she pleaded with the Goddess to rescue her from the pesky lover, which the Goddess did ... by changing her into a tulip.

Last but not least, here’s a lovely English Folk Tale:

The Tulip Fairies

Once upon a time there was an old woman who lived by herself in a little house. She grew a bed of beautiful multi-colored tulips in her garden, which she would cut and bring into the house, to cheer herself up.

One night she was woken up by the sounds of sweet singing and of babies laughing. She looked out of the window and the sounds seemed to be coming from the tulip bed, but she couldn't see anything. The next morning she walked among her flowers, but there were no signs of anyone having been there the night before.

On the following night she was woken up again by sweet singing and the sound of babies laughing. She rose and stole softly through her garden. The moon was shining brightly on the tulip bed, and the flowers were swaying to and fro. The old woman looked closely and she saw, standing by each tulip, a little fairy mother who was crooning and rocking the flower like a cradle, while in each tulip cup lay a little baby fairy laughing and playing.

The old woman was a kind-hearted soul, and so she stole quietly back to her house, and from that time on she never picked another tulip, nor did she allow her neighbors to touch them.

The tulips grew brighter in color and larger in size day by day, and they gave off a delicious perfume, like that of roses. They began to bloom all the year round too. And every night the little fairy mothers caressed their babies and rocked them to sleep in the flower cups.

Eventually, the day came, as it must, when the good old woman died, and the tulip bed was torn up by people who did not know any better, they didn't know about the fairies, they didn't know about the babies, and instead of tulips they planted parsley, but the parsley withered, and died, and so did all the other plants in the garden, and from that time on nothing would grow there.

But the good old woman's grave grew beautiful, for the fairies sang above it, and kept it green - while on the grave and all around it there sprang up tulips, daffodils, and violets, and all the other lovely flowers of spring.

The End.

Enchanted Tulips

ENCHANTED TULIPS

“TULIPS white and tulips red,

Sweeter than a violet bed!

Say, old Mother Bailey, say

Why your tulips look so gay,

Why they smell so sweet, and why

They bloom on when others die?

“By the pixies’ magic power

Do my tulips always flower,

By the pixies’ magic spell

Do they give so sweet a smell!

Tulips, tulips, red and white,

Fill the pixies with delight!

“Pixy women, pixy men,

Seek my tulips from the glen;

Midnight come, they may be heard

Singing sweet as any bird,

Singing their wee babes to rest

In the tulips they love best!”

(Enchanted Tulips and Other Verses for Children.

Author: Keary, M. (Maud).

Publication Year: 1914

Source: London: Macmillan and Co., 1914. 112 p.

Genre: poetry

Subject: Children's poetry, English

Bookmark: http://purl.dlib.indiana.edu/iudl/vwwp/VAB7182)

A Tulip

 Tulips are spring-blooming perennials that grow from bulbs. Tulips are indigenous to mountainous areas in temperate climates and need a period of cool dormancy. They thrive in climates with long, cool springs and dry summers. Although perennials, tulip bulbs are often imported to warm-winter areas of the world from cold-winter areas, and are planted in the fall to be treated as annuals.

Depending on the species, tulip plants can grow as short as 4 inches (10 cm) or as high as 28 inches (71 cm). The tulip’s large flowers usually bloom on scapes or subscapose stems that lack bracts. Most tulips produce only one flower per stem, but a few species bear multiple flowers on their scapes. The showy, generally cup- or star-shaped tulip flower has three petals and three sepals, which are often, termed tepals because they are nearly identical. These six tepals are often marked near the bases with darker colorings. Tulip flowers come in a wide variety of colors, except pure blue (several tulips with “blue” in the name have a faint violet hue). Meaning: Avowal. “By this token I declare my passion.”

Origin of Tulips

Although tulips are often associated with the Netherlands, it was first cultivated in the Ottoman Empire.  The word tulip, which earlier appeared in English as tulipa or tulipant, entered the language through the French from Ottoman Turkish tülbend ("muslin" or "gauze") and previously it was derived from the Persian- delband ("Turban") because of a perceived resemblance of the shape of a tulip flower to that of a turban. 

During the Ottoman Empire, the tulip became very popular in Ottoman territories and was seen as a symbol of abundance and indulgence.  As a matter of fact, the era during which the Ottoman Empire was wealthiest is often called the Tulip era or “Lale Devri” in Turkish.

Now these Tulips or Lales as they are also called in Iran, Turkey, Macedonia, Serbia and Bulgaria comprise many species that together are indigenous to a vast area encompassing parts of Asia, Europe and North Africa.

In Persia, to give a red tulip was to declare your love. The black center of the red tulip was said to represent the lover's heart, burned to a coal by love's passion. To give a yellow tulip was to declare your love hopelessly and utterly.

Although it is unknown who first brought the tulip to Northwestern Europe, the most widely accepted belief however is that it was Oghier Ghislain de Busbecq, an ambassador for Ferdinand I of Germany to Suleyman the Magnificent of the Ottoman Empire. The year 1594 is considered the official date of the tulip's first flowering in the Netherlands.  

Needless to say from the first the Tulips’ popularity in Europe soared quickly.  Carolus Clusius is largely responsible for the spread of tulip bulbs in the final years of the sixteenth century. His first major work on tulips in 1592, he made note of the variations in colour that help make the tulip so admired and while occupying a chair as a faculty member in the school of medicine at the University of Leiden, he planted both a teaching garden and private plot of his own with tulip bulbs. In 1596 and 1598, Clusius suffered thefts from his garden, with over a hundred bulbs stolen in a single raid.

Then between the years of 1634 and 1637, the enthusiasm for the Tulips triggered a speculative frenzy now known as the “Tulip mania”.  By this time tulips had become so expensive that they were treated as a form of currency. 

Presently, tulips are associated with the Netherlands, and the cultivated forms of the tulip are often called "Dutch tulips." In addition to the tulip industry and tulip festivals, the Netherlands has the world's largest permanent display of tulips at Keukenhof, although the display is only open to the public seasonally.

The Tulip’s popularity spread far and wide; it is believed the first tulips in the United States were grown near Spring Pond at the Fay Estate in Lynn and Salem, Massachusetts.

Today, Tulip festivals are held throughout the world, including Spalding, England, in Holland and in Morges, Switzerland.  North America being no exception there are several Tulip festivals held every year in Michigan, in the Skagit Valley, Washington, Orange City and Pella, Iowa, and the Canadian Tulip Festival in Ottawa, Canada. Tulips are now also popular in Australia and several festivals are held in September and October, during the Southern Hemisphere's spring.

The End.