Seeing Red. Flame Lily, Gloriosa superba, Hortus Botanicus, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
I've seen this beautiful Flame Lily, Gloriosa superba, in Botanical Gardens in the Far East but also in the wild in Malaysian Borneo (www.flickr.com/photos/87453322@N00/8410005519/in/photolis...), but here it is in the Tropical Glass House of the Amsterdam Hortus.
Today it's officially called Gloriosa superba, much to the raging anger of William Jackson Hooker of Curtis's Botanical Magazine in 1853. For a number of historical reasons and a linguistic-aesthetic one, he insists, 'Methonica ought to be adopted and not that barbarissimum nomen, Gloriosa; and the specific name ought to be Malabarorum, and not superba'. He has a point, I think. But the history of plant classification goes on and the name 'Gloriosa superba' has held. And is it really so terrible to name our Flame Lily Superbly Glorious?
Seeing Red. Flame Lily, Gloriosa superba, Hortus Botanicus, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
I've seen this beautiful Flame Lily, Gloriosa superba, in Botanical Gardens in the Far East but also in the wild in Malaysian Borneo (www.flickr.com/photos/87453322@N00/8410005519/in/photolis...), but here it is in the Tropical Glass House of the Amsterdam Hortus.
Today it's officially called Gloriosa superba, much to the raging anger of William Jackson Hooker of Curtis's Botanical Magazine in 1853. For a number of historical reasons and a linguistic-aesthetic one, he insists, 'Methonica ought to be adopted and not that barbarissimum nomen, Gloriosa; and the specific name ought to be Malabarorum, and not superba'. He has a point, I think. But the history of plant classification goes on and the name 'Gloriosa superba' has held. And is it really so terrible to name our Flame Lily Superbly Glorious?