The Wohl Rose Park is a live natural museum of numerous rose species. The collection comprises
inter alia such names as:
(1) Double Delight, Hybrid Tea, Swirn & Ellis '77;
(2) Esmeralda (Keepsake), Hybrid Tea, Kordes '81;
(3) Fragrant Cloud, Hybrid Tea, Tantau '67;
(4) Pascali, Hybrid Tea, Lens '63; and
(5) Tropicana (Super Star), Hybrid Tea, Tantau '60.
Considering the name 'Hybrid Tea' standing next to each name and myself being a non-black tea gan enthusiast I might assume majority of the rose varieties could be easily used for non-/medical use in our home kitchens, like the special rose species of very thick petals processed for jam. I have tasted it! Anyway, please do not take my guess as a professional herbalist's prescription. You'd better cylor (Yinglish acronym: 'Consult Your Local Orthodox Rabbi') first, whether this rose petal is good or not for the Jews when consumed in the disguise of a hot tea. Do mix your own tea with the Boston Tea Party. This might be a fatal recipe -- G-o-d forbid.
In fact, it is not that easy to keep rose flowers fresh on the bush for long as the local sunshine is very intensive, and daily exposure to sunbeams shortens their glamour, unless the rose bed is somewhere in a tree shade. Actually, many different trees and bushes have been also planted in the Park, so the roses constitute only a part of the overall view of natural beauty.
A praiseworthy innovation of the Wohl Park is the presence of plaques in the Braille alphabet,
which describe the rose species grown there. It is very important we should all not create this
world as a place of enjoyment for the privileged healthy and wise only, as in the ancient
societies of Athens and Sparta, whose law was to kill those weak and sick. We should rather welcome on equal rights all those who have not been endowed with many capacities. This reminds me of a special cinema for the blind that functioned in some country. The films there were presented in such a way by a creative narrator that through the aural sense the blind visitors could much better foster their
mind representations. A big credit to the donors about whom the Wohl Park plaque says:
'Swiss Garden for the Blind. A gift of the people of Switzerland & the Rose City, Rapperswil.
Dedicated by Renata Cotti, Wife of the President of the Confederation of Switzerland
17 May '98' '.
The Rose Park has got some living non-human residents too. The fauna is present both above (birds, flies, and mosquitoes), upon (ants) and under (bugs) the park ground. There are also some 'marines': little fish in the pond, which may add the Rose Park an extra informal status of aquarium-rosarium (Latin: 'a special ornamental place for growing roses) :)
Now let us study some more rose species, not limiting ourselves to those present at the Wohl Rose Park.
'*Largest rose tree* A Lady Banks rose at Tombstone, AZ has a trunk 40 in. thick, stands 9 ft. high and
covers an area of 5,380 sq. ft. It is supported by 68 posts and several thousand feet of piping, which enables 150 people to be seated under the arbor. The cutting came from Scotland in 1884.'
(Matthews 1993:117).
To easily decypher a complex Latin name of a specific rose species as indexed in a herbal, there is an aid below. A sort of a 'Name of the Rose' glossary reads as follows:
'Translations of the botanical Latin follow:
hemispaerica--semiglobose;
sulphurea--sulphur yellow;
canina--pertaining to dogs, canine or "doggy";
damascena--from Damascus;
foetida--stinking;
lutea--yellow;
moschata--musky;
semperflorens--ever-flowering;
sempervirens--ever-green;
gallica--from France;
alba--white;
rubra--red;
centifolia--hundred-petalled;
chinensis--Chinese;
indica--Indian;
gigantea--gigantic;
rugosa--wrinkled;
odorata--scented and
multiflora--many-flowered.'
(Goor 1981:11).
'The ancient Greeks and Romans entertained the superstition that the root--or could it have been
the stem?--of the dog-rose, if chewed by the bitten victim, was a remedy for rabies. Pliny records
this bit of semantic***homoeopathy withy typical credulousness. There is even a theory, equally
folk-etymological, that *canina* was so named because it was given to dogs to eat! Ancient
scholars, by the way, were careful to forbid the eating of roses alone, either raw or cooked. First,
they prescribed, one must steep them in honey; but the presumption is the ban did not apply
to the diet of dogs.'
(Goor 1981:12).
'An attractive wild rose of the Holy Land is *Rosa phoenicia Boiss*, which is of Mediterranean origin, flowering from May to August.'
(Goor 1981:11).
As you know Phoenicia is the ancient Phoenician-speaking place of the present-day Arabic-speaking Lebanon (Arabic: 'lubnan' = Hebrew: 'levanon'; cf. the ancient Latin name 'Helvetia' standing for 'Switzerland' on Swiss postage stamps). Both Phoenician and Arabic belonging to the Semitic language family. So, let us glance at some rosy*** eauty of of Lebanon beneath as briefly depicted by Mr Asaph Goor in the Hebrew-language original (yet another Semitic-speaking connection).
'*R. libanetica Boiss* or *R. glutinosa Sibth* and *Sm.*, a denizen, in the main, of Lebanon and Mount Hermon (...)
(Goor 1981:13).
Another rose having a toponym in it is name is the rose of Jericho, with a further allegorical explanation from a source used by Freemasonic Brethren.
'The rose of Jericho grows in the sandy deserts of Arabia and on the Syrian housetops. Scarcely six inches
high, it loses its leaves after the flowering season, and dries up into the form of a ball. Then it is uprooted by the winds, and carried, blown, or tossed across the desert, into the sea. There, feeling the contact of the water, it unfolds itself, expands its branches, and expels its seeds from their seed-vessels. These, when saturated with water, are carried by the tide and laid on the sea-shore. Many are lost, as many individual lives of men are useless. But many are thrown back again from the sea-shore into the desert, where, by the virtue of the sea-water that they have imbibed, the roots and leaves sprout and they grow into fruitful plants, which will, in their turns, like their ancestors, be whirled into the sea. G-o-d [non-hyphenated spelling in the original -- MdM] will not be less careful to provide for the germination of the truths you may boldly utter forth. *"Cast,"* He has said, *"thy bread upon the waters, and after many days it shall return to thee again."*'
(Morals 1954: 96).
Roses can not only adorn or embellish. They can also feed you when you hungry of love, or virtually,
hungry of vitamins and calories and There are twelve edible rose species mentioned by the American scientist E. Louis Sturtevant in his botanical *magnum opus* (Latin: 'a person's main literary or artistic work').
|
[p. 503] '*Rosa acicularis* Lindl. *Rosaceae*. Northern Asia and North America. (...)
| | *R. canina* Linn. BRIER ROSE. DOG-BRIER. (...) The fruits of this wild rose have a scanty,
orange, acid, edible pulp and were collected in ancient times in Europe when garden fruits
were few and scarce. (...)
| | [p. 504] *R. centifolia* Linn. CABBAGE ROSE. In China, the blossoms are used for scenting tea.
| | *R. cinnamomea* Linn. CINNAMON ROSE. The berries, or seed capsules, are eaten (...) by
the Alaska Indians. They are sweet and juicy. The fruit is eaten by the Kamchatkians.
| | *R. fraxinellaefolia* Andr. ASH-LEAVED ROSE. (...) The haws are eaten by the Indians of
the Cascade Mountains and by the Nez Perce/s. (...)
| | *R. macrophylla* Lindl. Himalayan region and China. In India (...) the fruit is eaten.
| | *R. nutkana* Presl. (...) The fruit is juicy, pleasantly acidulous and is an excellent antiscorbutic
for the Alaska Indians.
| | *R. rubginosa* Linn. EGLANTINE. SWEETBRIAR. (...) Berries (...) collected and sold in
Norway.
| | *R. rugosa* Thunb. TURKESTAN ROSE. Eastern Asia. This rose is called *mau*, or in
Japanese *humanasi*, and the fruit is generally eaten by the Ainos.
| | *R. semperflorens* Curt. MONTHLY ROSE. RED CHINA ROSE. [No political etymology
implied here -- MdM]. China. The Chinese serve the flowers of this rose dressed whole,
as a ragout.
| | *R. spinosissima* [cf. the family name of the Spanish-Portuguese Dutch Jewish philosopher
Baruch Spinoza; no proper name is coincidental, and even in apparently meaningless
sound clusters, like e.g. the Da Da manifesto of the pre-Futurist Dadaist artists, there is a
deeper covert sense yet to be discovered -- MdM] Linn. BURNET ROSE. (...) The deep
purple [cf. the famous music group 'Deep Purple' -- MdM] fruit of this rose, so abundant
on sandy shores in Britain, is very sweet and pleasant to the taste.
| | *R. villosa* Linn. (...) The fruit has a pleasant, acid pulp, which is sopmetimes served at dessert
in the form of conserves or sweetmeats.
| | [p. 505] *Rosmarinus [cf. Latin: *Rosa Maria* 'Mary Rose' (the rose being a symbol of the N.T.
Mary in Xian art), or *rosa marina* 'sea rose' -- MdM] officinalis* Linn. *Labiatae*.
ROSEMARY [cf. 'The Rosemary Baby', a Roman Polanski film on the Satanist cult; cf. also
the name of the street HaRosmarin in South Jerusalem, where the ecumemical Tantur
Institute is located -- MdM] (...) grown in gardens for its use in flavouring meats and soups.
(...) familiar to the Arab physicians of Spain in the thirteenth century (...). In 1778, Mawe
names four varieties: Common Narrow-leaved, Broad-leaved, the Silver-striped and Gold-
striped-leaved. It was in American gardens in 1806 or earlier.'
(Hedrick 1972:503-505) |
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