The ancient Greeks believed that every flower must be directly related to the gods - crocuses

The flower language of crocuse is: happiness, prayer, enthusiasm, loyalty

When few other flowers bloom, little spring crocuses appear in a fresh and cute manner. It takes its name from the flower that is closely related to it and is famous - the autumn saffron. The ancient Greeks called this flower kroke – "thread" because it has three stigmas like threads.

Saffron has been cultivated for a long time as a medicine, condiment, perfume or dye, so its origin is uncertain, but it is generally believed to be Greece, Asia Minor, and even Persia and Egypt.

The ancient Greeks believed that every flower must be directly related to the gods – otherwise how could there be such a beautiful thing on earth? So there are two myths that can be used to illustrate the crocus.

The gods descended to a green meadow on Mount Olympus to play games and race. The long-winged angel god Machuri certainly could not participate in the race, and even the fastest god was not interested in watching, because they seemed to him extremely slow. He lazily picked up a discus and threw it out in his boredom, not noticing where it might fall.

The discus hits Crocus, the youngest son of the goddess Europa. Korox died instantly. Let the god Machuri run over. He found the blood of this young son on the ground, and he turned the blood into a flower, and this flower has henceforth been called by this child Korox.

"Lovely Europa's cape

Kicked off shoulders, dragged backwards,

A crocus withers in one hand and grasps it in the other

Golden horns of gentle bulls. ”

The poem by Tennyson refers to Europa's love for the young son. After the death of her youngest son, she always carried a saffron flower on her.

This is what the Greeks said about this little flower. The flower was highly valued at the time and used as a medicine, as well as playing an important role in commerce, but they were not satisfied, so they offered another myth.

A young man named CroCus falls deeply in love with a happy, young shepherdess. The old wind god Jephiros saw the smiling shepherdess when he walked over and fell in love with her. But she didn't pay attention to him, because she loved young Korox so much. Fengshen was very angry. In order to get rid of his opponents, he turned the young man into the flower that still bears this name today. Then he began courting the shepherdess.

But the shepherdess is no longer happy, and she is saddened by the lost lover. She no longer wanted to be involved with this wind god who took her lover. The wind god was enraged and turned the girl into a yew. Yew still symbolizes sorrow and sorrow, and the wind still woos it.

Two thousand years or more ago, saffron spread to Italy – and the Italians undoubtedly had trading relations with the Greeks. The cultivation of this flower for commercial purposes is still one of the Italian industries today. Pliny mentioned it in the first century as an important product of Sicily at the time. The Sicilians had their own stories to illustrate its origins. This story is a folk tale that has been passed down for generations.

A boy named Nicola, dressed in rags, walked heavily down the dusty road, carrying a basket of grapes to the market to sell. The grapes were beautiful, big and fleshy, but he was a very small boy, so no one paid attention to him in a crowded market.

By noon, the grapes were still in the basket. He looked at the grapes hungry, but would have been beaten if he did not return home with the money. He had to wait a little longer and eat another grape. As he sat there miserably, an old woman approached him.

"Would you please give me some grapes?" She asked, "I don't have any money, but I'm hungry." ”

Little Nicola looked at the poor old woman. She did look hungry, dressed in rags like him, and looked very miserable. Driven by a rush, he picked up the best bunch of grapes for her, and she sat next to him and ate. She ate the grapes one by one, getting younger and younger, and her clothes became less and less torn, and moreover, more and more beautiful.

Nikola," said the young girl, who was originally an old woman, "take the rest of the grapes back to your father's field. Plant them there, one at a time. ”

Nikola knew that she must be a fairy or goddess and listened to her without hesitation. He ran along the path he had walked heavily that morning. The purple grapes were all planted in the field, and he picked up the basket and prepared to go home to change the beating, when every grape that the old woman ate turned golden.

And that's not all. The grapes he planted turned into flowers overnight, and the fields were covered with crocuses. The herbalist was amazed and tried them to find that they were wonderful medicines, so Nikola and his family became rich, and he never had to walk heavily on the road with a basket of grapes to sell.

Saffron has no medicinal effect, but for hundreds of years it has been regarded as a stimulant to a considerable extent, and in many countries as a cheese. Italians even believe that just holding a crocuse in your hand creates an excitatory effect; It enlivens a person's spirit and provides him with strength.

This superstition spread to Austria, but the Austrians wanted others, especially enemies, to pick crocus. The flower stem is broken and the flower becomes fragile: to replenish its strength, it sucks all the strength out of the person who picks it.

According to legend, it was the returning crusaders who introduced the crocuse to France, Germany and England, not because they thought of its value, but because in the country where they found the flower grown, the bulbs of this "plant gold" were strictly forbidden to be taken abroad. Their interest was aroused by the prohibition, and the threat of execution by violators increased their interest, so the Crusaders took away as many bulbs as they could.

There is a legend in the English town of Severon Walden that its important crocuse industry reached its peak at the end of the sixteenth century when a crusader stole a bulb and hid it in a cane, and painstakingly dug a hole in the cane to achieve this purpose.

Autumn crocuses now occupy their place in many gardens because of their delicate lilac or white flowers. But it blooms in autumn, when there are still colorful flowers competing in the gardens and fields, so it will never be as popular as the little saffron in spring, because the latter appears just in time to send a sign of the joy of the coming of a vigorous spring for the world tired of winter.

If humans can imagine that this flower blooms early to bring them hope, it is very pleasant. But that's not the case with the Irish. For them, the flower is the "flower of St. Valentine", they say, and this flower opens so early just to pay homage to St. Valentine on St. Valentine Day. So the Irish collected any crocuses that opened in mid-February and brought them to the shrine of St. Valentine.

For this purpose, they liked yellow crocuses, because they knew that fairies did not need yellow flowers at all, and purple crocuses could provide a popular shelter for young fairies on cold spring nights. So for the sake of the good Saint Valentine, they are reluctant to pick flowers that fairies may need.