Sidonie(Sydonie)

Non una prima donna, ma estremamente interessante, come personaggio
più umile e riservata.

Po tra questo gruppo straordinario che sono le
Portland. questa rosa che nasce dalla mitica belle du trianon de
Vibert come Comte de Chambord , Yolande D' Aragon etc...  Questa rosa
si comporta come il nome che li venne attribuito dal geniale  Vibert (
che diffuse solo rose eccezionali)che lo prese dal Armide di Lully,
capolavoro del barocco francese. Sidonie era una delle ancelle
guerriere di Armide.
 Quest' opera molto famosa e ripresa anche da Gluck, sempre dallo
stesso libretto i cui temi sono : desiderio di vendetta, che si
trasformano sucessivamente in amore e poi abbandono. Il tema era stato
scelto da Luigi XIV, apposta come riferimento alla sua lotta contro i
protestanti. Il re non si presentò alla première per l omessualità di
Lully che aveva fatto scandalo. Questa rosa come il genio di Lully,
subisce una certa ingiustizia, e viene snobbata per le altre prime
donne del gruppo a cui fà da fedele spalla. Sempre in fiore e le
ondate di fioriture principali, sono scalate in confronto alle altre
del gruppo, quindi grazie a lei si riescono ad avere note fiorite, in
periodi di scarsità di fiori.
 La pianta é alta come portland,  rigidina, si ammala solo nei climi
molto umidi, ma qualche foglia malata non distoglie questa macchina da
guerra da produrre fiori.
 I fiori son di grandezza media, hanno la forma del taglio a diamante
di certe pietre dure. i petali sono come del satin arruffato, di un
colore rosa argento, con leggere sfumature salmone. Il profumo é forte
di damascena, ma bisogna avvicinarsi per sentirlo.il fogliame é un pò grezzo ma bello.crescita dal metro e qualche a poco di più a meno che non si trovi benissimo...
Una bellissima rosa, dalle mille qualità da conoscere a da fare da
spalla alle prime donne. Sidonie é si riferisce anche a Sidonie di Baviera a  un ordine cavalleresco per donne. Due sidonie furono accusate di stregoneria  la sidonie di Sassonia. ( che si sposò con suo cugino che dopo  matrimonio voleva avvelenarla)

A genius from Gradisca


Matteo La Civita is without a shadow of doubt a genius concerning Peonies. His stern obsession for the genealogy of Peonia Rockii is absolutely fascinating. He grows in his enchanting garden in Gradisca, relatively close to the Beautiful Triest, with the fanstastic coast and the neartby Slovenia and Croatia.

    In this magnificent setting, in Arcadic Friuli, garden designer Matteo has a breathtaking garden, and fantastic collection of bulbs and rare plants in general.

        Matteo has the most comprenensive collection of Peonia Rockii. The story of this species is fascinating and almost romantic, and for decades, what was considered a species was in fact a hybrid.
it was originally seen by Farrer and poorly described.

 Then a very mysterious guy Mr Rock found some specimens and created a very romantic story on how he found them. Mr Joseph Rock was indded a very romantic figure. He was apparently the son of the buttler of a very rich guy who adopted him. He travelled all europe and egypt, and then emigrated to United states, and from new york, he moved to Honolulu.

 In a few weeks or months he learned hawaian language and he created the first Hawaian dictionary, became the first botanist of the island . He then went to Asia, and he assited the ferocious war between the chinese muslim and the tibetans. he recalls the latter s heads were used as decoration"young girls and children"'s heads staked around the military encampment. Ten to fifteen heads were fastened to the saddle of every Muslim cavalryman.The heads were "strung about the walls of the Moslem garrison like a garland of flowers." i will  talk about the story of the Rock s peony in another post. Now we are just enjoying Matteo s Peonies. I m insisting for him to sell them.what do you think about that? Will speak more about his collection next week

Damask roses and the  victims of terrorism

I was writing this article to mourn, the victims of the St Petersburg terrorist attack, and I am glad i did not do it , because there have been the chemical attacks in Syria where children and women died in such an atrocious way.Yesterday, Trump did  send 50 something missiles. 

After the lies on the Iraki war, and on the Arab spring I really don t know what to say about this war. America is right, or Putins? My answer is that i think it is very silly to wonder who is right or wrong. I think we are all wrong, and responsible of this massacre. 

        People really ignore and don t care about the war until, the got shocked by the images,( and feel guilty about it) and i think it is just sheer hypocrisy. We all know about that, we carry on our lives with our trivial issues, and we got shocked when the reality is shown in such a blatant way, or when these atrocities ate nearby(In Europe ). I posted a Damask rose la Ville de bruxelles to all my Belgian friends instead of putting je suis Bruxelles in my facebook profile. My aim was to stress that culture and our common roots as the only way  which can help us from being manipulated either by europe, usa and russia and jihadists. The aim of these people is to separate people, in different camps: the putin followers, the trump followers the isis followers. Followers like instagram, facebook, twitter. 

     By separating we rule, said the old Roman adagio, and this is the aim of this mediatic war. We know nothing about the subject, and people troll one other  on these social medias, discussing and quarreling.But according to me this is their plan. I think we should be less selfish and recognise we really don t know a fuck about these issues, and no matter how we pretend to inform ourselves to feel less guilty, we know nothing about this Syrian Holocaust-. Official news and unofficial news are just crap, and so are journalists, some are in good faith, some are not.

 The first terrorist attacks were on culture, the Great  Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan destroyed by the talibans, and this was just the beginning--- The semi destruction of Palmyra. The destruction of culture is the real aim of the terrorists war lead both by the jihadists, by america, europe and russia. Culture is the only way to fight all this grand manipulation. Less media and more books. And in this case roses. Damask roses, old roses, threatened by extinction. Belgium was a great producer of old roses of extreme quality. These roses were not mass produced, but they were pieces of art, and it revealed a great culture. Belgians are more than often shadowed by the French and the Dutch, but number of artists are belgian and they don t make a fuss whether they are belgian or not, they just want to be international. The great Marguerite Yourcenar, in her book oeuvre au noir, shows that violence is not something new, and it is part of humankind.

The Damask roses are said to be imported during the crusades by Robert de Brie around 1200 from Syria. They were known and grown by the romans, and quoted by Plinius. So maybe they just survived  in some remote places and then widespread By de Brie, or just brought back by Muslim invaders in spain? The Muslim invasion of spain brought back culture to europe, which was indulging in great barbarity. Jews, Muslim and christians lived in a certain kind of peace and tollerence. In spanish Damask roses are clled rosas de castilla, where they brought the muslim invaders, like Plato ( thanks to Avicenna and Averrhoes) medicine, astrology and protoscience? On the other hand crusades are seen in the West in a kind of mythological way, with great and brave knights. But was is really like that? The crusades have been a crime in the history of mankind. In The crusades seen by the Muslims by Amin Maalouf the atrocities of the crusaders are well documented. But again this might induce to be in one side of history. With Syria we got a shared past of cultural links, and we need to stress about it and not to see it as a remote place we have nothing to share with.

I am not a historian so I will just stress on the damask roses, and their attar of roses, which can be found in Channel n 5  made with  damask roses  and other ingredients. Rose water was very important in medieval europe, and rose are used in many things. In our Greco/ roman heritage roses have a strong importance. In our christian heritage rose is seen as a symbol of the fall from eden ( they had not thorns in the Eden garden)and roses were involved in the miracles of  Elisabeth of Hungary and Elisabeth of Portugal, santa Rita Da Cascia amd the virgin of Guadalupe.

Not to forget the great Damask fabrics, which i totally adore....

Thanks to Damask roses I will remember as well the Russian victims of terrorism. Damask roses are a cross of Rosa Gallica and Rosa Moschata and Rosa Fedtschenkoana. It was discovered by Olga Fédschenko in China. This rose brought the reflowering gene and the grayish leaves to the Damask roses. The importance of this rose is relatively recent, and it was discovered by a genetical test.

 I want to remember that yesterday it was the anniversary of Stravinsky s death, and his sacre du printemps, and the firebird shows a need to go back to our pagan roots and praise nature. This cultural love of spring and renovation I think it is the only way for us, who live por daily life without helping directly people in Syria. I think, if we don t do something directly, she should not be moralists for five seconds and then forget the people we have been using for five minutes for feeling less guily and morally superior. I can only honor them, with what I like more culture and roses , and I don t pretend to know the political things going on, and in fact I don t care, we are all wrong, and war is bad and there are no good nor bad ones. In Aghanistan thet are trying to grow roses for producing the attar of roses instead of Oppium, sold by the terrorists, a proof that plants and culture are not just a trivial thing, and we need to see Syria as something close and not something remote. we don t have to see them as refugees but as people, with the right to have their culture and Peace.

all images were taken from the web