Beijing, 19 May (ZXS) -- How did the "flower of love" rose travel from China to the world through ancient and modern times?
——Interview with Wang Guoliang, winner of the "World Rose Master Award" and researcher of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs of Jiangsu Province
Written by Xiao Yudi
"Willows are green, roses are red." Ancient China used magnificent pearls and beautiful jade, Rosa L. The rose with a fruit as large as a cherry tomato is named "rose". Nowadays, influenced by various cultural exchanges and translation habits, "rose" mostly refers to the moon season, rose and rose, and is dubbed the meaning of "flower of love". In fact, the popular rose variety today was originally the modern moon season, which is the result of long-term and complex intercourse between the ancient Chinese moon season and the ancient rose of Europe.
How did the rose, which represents "romance", cross the sea and arrive in Europe from China? On the occasion of the "May 20" online Valentine's Day, Wang Guoliang, winner of the "World Rose Master Award" and researcher of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs of Jiangsu Province, was interviewed by China News Agency's "East-West Question" to talk about the past and present life of roses.
The following is a summary of the interview:
China News Agency: Please share your experience of winning the "World Rose Master Award". How has your academic research influenced the "Western Rose Origin Theory"?
Wang Guoliang: In 2016, I was invited to visit the Huntington Library, Art Gallery and Botanical Garden in California. The selection committee of the award awarded me the "World Rose Master Award" based on my academic research achievements and influence in the fields of roses and moon seasons for many years.
On June 19, 2016, Pat Shanley, president of the American Monthly Season Association, personally presided over the World Rose Master Award ceremony for Wang Guoliang. Photo courtesy of interviewee
The slogan "China Rose, World's Roses" that I put forward in my early years has been recognized at home and abroad after years of international academic activities.
Previously, the West set the time limit for the emergence of the "modern lunar season" in 1867, and the first variety was "La France" in France, whose main morphology and traits were characterized by long and broad petals, broad and thick leaves, blooming in all seasons, and flowers with tea fragrance. In fact, modern lunar seasons such as "France" are no different from ancient Chinese moon seasons such as "Spring Water Green Wave" and "Golden Ou Pangreen". These ancient lunar seasons have been prevalent in China as early as the Northern Song Dynasty, and there are countless famous species.
The modern Rosa hybrid 'Peace' bred by France-Francis Merang in 1939. Photo courtesy of interviewee
The moon season is not wild, but a new variety bred by ancient Chinese gardeners through the improvement of wild roses. Based on its seasonal flowering characteristics, the ancients called this type of rose "moon season".
After the Europeans crossed the ancient Chinese moon season with local roses, they completed the European localization of the ancient Chinese moon season, forming modern popular varieties such as "European moon". The most popular "rose" in florists around the world today is actually the type of cut flower that has been inserted for a relatively long time.
Lady Yu Guo, a famous breed of the ancient Chinese moon season. Photo courtesy of interviewee
China News Agency: How did the popular rose cultivate and evolve? Why did the ancient Chinese moon season take root in the gardens of Europeans?
Wang Guoliang: To understand the past and present lives of rose evolution, it is necessary to sort out the cultivation history of roses in the East and West from both vertical and horizontal perspectives.
In 2005, at an international academic symposium, I proposed the six-stage theory of the evolution of the Chinese monthly season: ancient fossil period, ancestor introduction period, palace garden cultivation period, monthly season beginning period, north and south epidemic period, and fragrant world period. The first three stages belong to the rose period, and until the fourth stage, Chinese gardeners in the Wei and Jin dynasties used several kinds of roses unique to the deep mountains and old forests of Sichuan and Yunnan to cultivate monthly flowering and seasonal flowering. Unfortunately, we now have no way of knowing how the ancients cultivated the lunar season through whimsy.
Ancient Chinese rose cultivar thornless powder ball rose. Photo courtesy of interviewee
Europe also began to cultivate roses into gardens thousands of years ago, and single-petal roses were artificially cultivated into double-petaled roses to form different varieties, including the famous Damascus rose (Damascus rose). Later, porcelain with the motif of the moon and season continued to arrive in Europe via the Maritime Silk Road. At that time, the most developed horticulture in Europe, Britain, only had more than a thousand species of ornamental plants, and peonies, moon seasons and other exotic flowers native to China surprised countless Europeans' dreams of oriental hunting. Around the 18th century, countless Chinese seasons were brought to Europe by missionaries and plant hunters. Because some of the monthly varieties that were introduced to Europe in the early days were not adapted to the local climate, it was difficult to winter in the open field, so Europeans crossed the monthly season with the local double-petaled rose.
The representative monthly seasons that play the role of germplasm platform in the formation of modern monthly seasons are the "four old species of China": "Pa's Pink Moon Season" (Moon and Moon Pink), "Si's Crimson Moon Season" (Red Dragon with Pearls), "P's Light Yellow Perfume Moon Season" and "Hue's Pink Halo Perfume Moon Season". They perform two important functions: providing the trait of "seasonal flowering" and the petals, flower type and aroma genes that Europeans call "tea fragrance".
For more than two hundred years, Europe has used the Chinese monthly season as a template to cultivate the popular "rose" in the market today, and completed the diversification and commercialization of the Chinese monthly season.
The ancient Chinese famous four-season double-petaled red rose, commonly known as the old rose, has a rich floral fragrance. Photo courtesy of interviewee
China News Agency: From a cultural point of view, what are the differences between Chinese and Western understandings of the meaning of the moon season or rose? What is the historical evolution of each?
Wang Guoliang: The rose culture in the West has a long history. I think the first time roses were associated with love was in ancient Rome. At that time, the ancient Romans called their beloved "the rose of the heart". In the Italian painter Botticelli's 1487 painting The Birth of Venus, the red and light pink flowers are roses. Therefore, the rose is also known as the "flower of the birth of Venus", becoming a symbol and embodiment of love and beauty.
In addition to "love", roses have multiple meanings. In ancient Europe, there was a tradition of wearing a garland of roses on the heads of soldiers after victory, where rose meant victory. Around the 15th and 16th centuries, in the series of paintings "Madonna and Child", many works are decorated with roses and hundred cooperation as the background, and the rose has become the embodiment of holiness. Napoleon presented roses to the Luxembourg National Primary School, which became a sign of friendship. At the end of World War II, in order to reflect the anti-fascist and peaceful aspirations of the people of the world, a yellow rose bred in France was named "Peace".
In China, rose culture is also rich and diverse. Five-petal patterned faience pot sacrificial vessels made about 7,000 to 6,000 years ago have been unearthed in various places, indicating that the rose was also a totem. Because of its widespread distribution, many ancient ancestors adopted it as a common belief. Therefore, some scholars have recently called roses "the flower of China".
Five-petal pattern faience pot, excavated at the Da Dunzi Cultural Site in Pizhou (Nanjing Museum collection). Photo courtesy of interviewee
The earliest "rose" character is also quite picturesque. Qingren Lei Jun said in the "Shuowen Wai Editor" that the "rose" of the rose should be "蘠" - there is a "wall" under the grass head, which refers to the vine of the rose climbing the wall. A wall of branches and flowers means vitality and vitality.
After the appearance of the lunar season, both the princes and nobles and the people of the city love this seasonal flower. By the Song Dynasty, the variety and popularity of the monthly season reached its peak. The Song Dynasty poet Yang Wanli praised: "Only a flower has no ten days of redness, and this flower has no spring breeze." Su Shi also said in the poem "Moon Season": "Only this flower does not tire of blooming, and it occupies four hours of spring a year." At that time, the ancients often gave the moon season "long music", "long spring" and "long life" and other meanings.
Ancient China did not associate roses with "love" and "romance", and only the allusion to "buying laughing flowers" was circulated in the affair of Emperor Wudi of Han. The meaning of roses representing love has been transmitted to China since modern times, and the Western culture of Valentine's Day and the exchange of roses between lovers has had a worldwide impact.
Chinese Song Dynasty vine this month famous species Huang Baoxiang, the first light pink, gradually beige, flower center with a red halo. When in full bloom, it is pure golden yellow, shining like gold leaf. Photo courtesy of interviewee
China News Agency: Today, the variety of the monthly season is becoming more and more abundant, but many ancient Chinese monthly seasons are decreasing day by day, how should we protect it? And how should we inherit and carry forward the culture of the moon season?
Wang Guoliang: What is widely popular in the market now is the improved modern moon season, and most people have never even seen the ancient Chinese moon season. There is also a misconception that many people take for granted that the ancient moon season is not as good as the modern moon season.
In fact, most of the ancient Chinese monthly seasons grow beautifully, and they are more disease-resistant, easier to feed and more leafy than the new varieties produced by long-term anti-complex interbreeding between varieties. We discovered the Ming Dynasty Moon Season of Mizumeji Temple, which I named Auspicious Cloud Pink Perfume Moon Season, which is more than 30 centimeters in diameter and blooms like a large tree. The pink perfume moon vine we found, with a height of more than 20 meters and a flower diameter of more than 10 centimeters, fell from the sky, like the lights of ten thousand homes blooming in Tianjie. These super lunar landscapes are stunning and can be called the "ceiling of the moon and season boundary".
Wang Guoliang uses the ancient Chinese pink perfume moon season design to create a large-scale landscape of heaven and earth Changchun. Photo courtesy of interviewee
From a cultural point of view, although the moon season has different cultural values in China and the West, it is generally believed that the moon season flower is a symbol of beauty. Whether it is as a "flower of love" or a "flower of eternal happiness", I think that through the figuration and image of the monthly flower, it expresses the beautiful emotions between people and the expectation of continuing this beauty, which is called beauty and harmony.
I wish to be born like the moon and the season of eternal spring, love like roses, love like roses lingering. (End)
Respondent Profile:
Wang Guoliang, winner of the "World Rose Master Award" and researcher of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs of Jiangsu Province. Graduate tutor of College of Horticulture, Nanjing Agricultural University. He graduated from Nanjing Forestry University in 1983 and studied at Chiba National University in Japan. He used to be the vice president of Jiangsu Academy of Forestry and now works for the Jiangsu Provincial Agricultural Commission. He has long been engaged in the research of the origin and evolution of the lunar season, rose and rose, collection and identification, diaspora and culture, cultivation and protection, breeding and utilization, and the design and construction of monthly and seasonal special gardens. He has published many monographs such as "The Ancient Moon Season of China", "Interpretation of the Atlas of the Rose Bible", and co-authored "Encyclopedia of Rose Science" (2003, British Science Press); reviewed many Chinese translations such as "British Moon" in English and "Rose of Time" in Japanese; He has published more than 60 papers in core journals in Chinese and English.