Ferociously Ostracised. Euryale ferox, Gorgon Plant, Botanischer Garten der Universität Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland
I was lucky. In the beautiful Botanical Gardens of the University of Zürich, Gorgon Plant, Euryale ferox, was just coming into bloom. In German it's called Teufelskopf, Devil's Head; the Greek 'Euryale' is the name for the second of the Immortal Gorgons. In English it was first named boringly if accurately Prickly Euryale. The scientific name Euryale ferox was given it by the tireless botanist Richard Anthony Salisbury (1761-1829). But he received little credit in general for his plant work; in fact, contemporary botanists ostracised and ignored him because he had the reputation not only of being financially dishonest - of course a huge crime for a gentleman, and many botanists then were indeed gentlemen - but also of showing little consideration for others. In fact, he has been described as a very devil, a Gorgon one might say... Whether he was handsome like his Flower in the photo, I don't know.
PS Some sort of PC-problem hinders my commenting on other people's beautiful photos. I hope to have this sorted out shortly. Please bear with me.
Ferociously Ostracised. Euryale ferox, Gorgon Plant, Botanischer Garten der Universität Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland
I was lucky. In the beautiful Botanical Gardens of the University of Zürich, Gorgon Plant, Euryale ferox, was just coming into bloom. In German it's called Teufelskopf, Devil's Head; the Greek 'Euryale' is the name for the second of the Immortal Gorgons. In English it was first named boringly if accurately Prickly Euryale. The scientific name Euryale ferox was given it by the tireless botanist Richard Anthony Salisbury (1761-1829). But he received little credit in general for his plant work; in fact, contemporary botanists ostracised and ignored him because he had the reputation not only of being financially dishonest - of course a huge crime for a gentleman, and many botanists then were indeed gentlemen - but also of showing little consideration for others. In fact, he has been described as a very devil, a Gorgon one might say... Whether he was handsome like his Flower in the photo, I don't know.
PS Some sort of PC-problem hinders my commenting on other people's beautiful photos. I hope to have this sorted out shortly. Please bear with me.