You may recall an earlier entry we posted about the Passionflower. It is an incredibly beautiful flower. But then I got a little curious. Where did that name come from? To what passion does the name refer? Romantic passion?Well, no. The story goes like this: The flower was named by Roman Catholic priests about 500 years ago when they discovered it growing in what is now called Latin America. Apparently some parts of the flower reminded them of the passion, or suffering, and death of Jesus Christ. Check out the photo
below with labels on parts of the passionflower and see if you can follow their line of thinking.
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| (Click on the photo to see it larger.) |
They said that the flower’s five petals and five sepals represented the ten faithful apostles who remained with Christ during his suffering. (Obviously Judas, the traitor, was excluded. And if there had been eleven petals and sepals, then maybe Peter wouldn’t have been left out. But since there were only ten and he denied Christ three times... well, sorry Peter!)
In the corona, made up of the hair-like rays above the petals, they saw Christ’s crown of thorns, or the halo which was common in religious art of that time.
The five stamens, each composed of a filament rising from the center and terminating in an anther, represented Christ’s supposed five wounds (two hands, two feet, and one in his side).
The three styles, which rise above the ovary, end in a button-like stigma, rather like a large-headed nail. And what could these represent? The nails used in the execution, of course!
So there you have it. But what do you think? If you had found this flower 500 years ago, what would you have called it?
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