PANSIES
COMMON NAMES: Violet, pansy, heart's- ease, Johnny-jump-ups, love in idleness.
BOTANICAL NAME: Viola.
FAMILY: Violaceae.
Violets (pansies) have long been associated with love. The fairy spirit Puck used their juice in a Midsummer Night's Dream to make "man or woman madly dote/Upon the next live creature that it sees." Most Elizabethans called them "hearts-ease" and often associated them with an innocent, unspoilt love; they are appropriate for that because the violet flowers do not produce seeds. The seeds come from unopened, self-pllllinating flowers later in the year, a quality called "cleistogamy"
A pansy, or pensee (from the French penser, "to think"), is what is in our thoughts, and we rely on purity of thought not to see the world crooked. Violets and pansies represent love, but love in its highest form.
BOTANICAL NAME: Viola.
FAMILY: Violaceae.
Violets (pansies) have long been associated with love. The fairy spirit Puck used their juice in a Midsummer Night's Dream to make "man or woman madly dote/Upon the next live creature that it sees." Most Elizabethans called them "hearts-ease" and often associated them with an innocent, unspoilt love; they are appropriate for that because the violet flowers do not produce seeds. The seeds come from unopened, self-pllllinating flowers later in the year, a quality called "cleistogamy"
A pansy, or pensee (from the French penser, "to think"), is what is in our thoughts, and we rely on purity of thought not to see the world crooked. Violets and pansies represent love, but love in its highest form.
posted by mollyworld at 2:42 PM
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