Seven flowers and how they shaped our world
By: Jennifer Potter
Publisher: Overlook Press
Published: 2014
Language: eng
Number of pages: 288
ISBN-13: 9781468308174
Subjects: History; Flowers; Plants and civilization
Other titles: 7 flowers and how they shaped our world
Description: Drawing on sources both ancient and modern, and featuring lush full-color illustrations and gorgeous line art throughout, Potter examines our changing relationship with these potent plants and the effects they had on civilizations through the ages. The opium poppy, for example, returned to haunt its progenitors in the West, becoming the source of an enormously profitable drug trade in Asia. In the seventeenth century, the irrational exuberance of the Dutch for rare tulips led to a nationwide financial collapse. Potter also explores how different cultures came to view the same flowers in totally different lights. While Confucius saw virtue and modesty in his native orchids, the ancient Greeks saw only lust and sex. In the eye of each beholder, these are flowers of life and death; of purity and passion; of greed, envy and virtue; of hope and consolation; of the beauty that drives men wild. All seven demonstrate the enduring ability of flowers to speak metaphorically--if we could only decode what they have to say.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references  and index.
Table of contents: title: Lotus; title: Lily; title: Sunflower; title: Opium poppy; title: Rose; title: Tulip; title: Orchid.