A plant epithet is a name used to label a person or group, by association with some perceived quality of a plant. Vegetable epithets may be pejorative, such as turnip, readily giving offence, or positive, such as rose or other flowers implying beauty. Tree and flower forenames such as Hazel, Holly, Jasmine and Rose are commonly given to girls. Tree surnames such as Oakes (Oak) and Nash (Ash) are toponymic, given to a person in the Middle Ages who lived in a place near a conspicuous tree. A few plant surnames such as Pease and Onions are metonymic, for sellers of peas and onions respectively. Finally, plant surnames are sometimes emblematic, as in the name Rose, used as a family emblem.
Plant epithets may be pejorative, used humorously and sometimes offensively. Some plant epithets are used directly as insults, as when people are called turnips, potatoes, or cabbages. [2] When the England football team lost to Sweden under Graham Taylor, The Sun newspaper led with the headline "Swedes 2 Turnips 1", swede being a pun on a particular vegetable, and turnip being an insult. [3] In English, the collective term vegetable is also pejorative. Plant epithets are used around the world, but the choice of plants and their meanings vary. Thus in China, "stupid melon" is used as an insult. [2] In Britain, coconut is sometimes used by black people to insult other people of colour; the term indicates betrayal, as coconuts are brown on the outside but white on the inside. [4] Trembling or quaking like an aspen leaf means shaking with fear; this may be descriptive or pejorative, and is recorded from around 1700 onwards, starting with Edward Taylor's Poems. [5] In 2022, the British prime minister Liz Truss was described as "Lettuce Liz" [6] and "The Iceberg Lady", [lower-alpha 1] her short term in office compared unfavourably to the shelf life of a head of lettuce. [8] [9] [10]
In contrast to vegetable epithets, flower and tree names are generally positive. "English rose" has traditionally been used to describe an attractive English woman with a fair complexion. An early documented usage is in Basil Hood's 1902 comic opera Merrie England , [11] while in modern times, the actress Gemma Arterton has been so described. [1]
Flower and tree names are used in many countries for girls; examples in English include Bryony, Daisy, Iris, Hazel, Heather, Holly, Hyacinth, Jasmine, Lily, Rose, and Violet. Forms of the generic term flower are also popular in English as in other languages, including for example Fleur, Flora, Florence and Flores. [12] [13] English flower names are less common for boys, but include Hawthorn; in the form of May, the same flower is used as a girl's name. [14] Laurel, for a victor's wreath made of the sweet bay or laurel, with feminine forms such as Laura, is used for both boys and girls. [15]
People acquired plant surnames in the Middle Ages for different reasons. Toponymic surnames were given to people who lived by a significant feature such as a large isolated tree, a group of trees, or a wood: or, very often, in a village beside such a feature. Metonymic surnames, on the other hand, denoted a person's profession, and include Pease, for a seller of peas, [16] and Onions, for a seller of onions (though some people with that surname got it from the Old Welsh name Enniaum). [17]
Plant or Plante itself may be a metonym (gardener), as with Plantebene (a grower of beans, 1199) and Planterose (a grower of roses, 1221), a metaphor meaning a branch of a family, or a toponym, as with de la Plaunt (1273) and de Plantes (1275, 1282), from a place in France such as le Plantis (Orne), or from a planted place such as a vineyard or orchard. [18] [19] [20]
Toponymic surnames include Oak, with variants such as Oake, Oke, Oakes, Noke and Roke since 1273, [21] [22] Ash, with variations such as Ashe, Asche, Aish, Esch and Nash since 1221, [23] [24] and Birch or Birchwood, since 1182. [25] Hazel is recorded in many toponymic surnames (sometimes via villages named for the tree), including Hazel itself from 1182, Hazelwood/Aizlewood, Hazelton, Hazelhurst, Hazelgrove, Hazelden and Heseltine. [26] Surnames such as Hollies and Hollin(g)s, since 1275, mean a person who lived by a holly or holm oak tree. [27] Surnames such as Plumtree, Plumpton, and Plumstead denote people who lived in places by a plum tree or orchard. [28] [29] Similarly, Appleby, Appleton, Applegarth and Appleyard name people who lived by an apple orchard, or in villages in Cheshire, Cumbria, Kent and Yorkshire which were named for their apple orchards. [30] Surnames including Apps, Asp, Epps and Hesp record that a person lived by an aspen tree, the letters often being swapped over. [31]
A third source of plant names is their use as emblems, as in the surnames Rose, Royce, and Pluckrose, all meaning a person who used the rose as their family emblem. [32] The English royal Plantagenet dynasty appears to have derived its name from the use of a sprig of broom or planta genista as an emblem. "Plantegenest" (or "Plante Genest") was a 12th-century nickname for Geoffrey Plantagenet, Count of Anjou and duke of Normandy; Richard of York, 3rd Duke of York adopted Plantagenet as his family name in the 15th century, perhaps to emphasise his status as a patrilineal descendant of Geoffrey. [33] [34]
Plant surnames are found in other languages. For example, in Sweden, where "Lind" means the Lime or Linden tree, the 100 most common surnames in 2015 included at 17 Lindberg (Lime-hill), at 21 Lindström (Lime-stream), at 22 Lindqvist (Lime-twig), at 23 Lindgren (Lime-branch), and at 99 Lindholm (Lime-island). Other tree names in the top 100 were 46 Björk (Birch), 56 Löfgren (Leaf-branch), 66 Björklund (Birchwood), 77 Ekström (Oak-stream), 79 Hedlund (Heathwood) and 87 Ek (Oak). [35] Many of these names are toponymic; however, suffixes like -gren and -qvist are often metaphorical, meaning an offshoot of a family. [36] From around 1686, Swedish soldiers started to adopt military surnames; short monosyllabic tree-names like Al (Alder), Alm (Elm) and Ek (Oak) were popular. [37]
In France, the surnames Laplante (the plant) and Levigne (the vine) denote the owner of a vineyard, or may be toponymic. [38] [39] Tree names also occur in France, where for example the surname Chene (oak) is not uncommon in Loire-Atlantique and Maine-et-Loire. [40]
Lettuce is an annual plant of the family Asteraceae. It is most often grown as a leaf vegetable, but sometimes for its stem and seeds. Lettuce is most often used for salads, although it is also seen in other kinds of food, such as soups, sandwiches and wraps; it can also be grilled. One variety, celtuce, is grown for its stems, which are eaten either raw or cooked. In addition to its main use as a leafy green, it has also gathered religious and medicinal significance over centuries of human consumption. Europe and North America originally dominated the market for lettuce, but by the late 20th century the consumption of lettuce had spread throughout the world. As of 2021, world production of lettuce and chicory was 27 million tonnes, 53 percent of which came from China.
Galls or cecidia are a kind of swelling growth on the external tissues of plants. Plant galls are abnormal outgrowths of plant tissues, similar to benign tumors or warts in animals. They can be caused by various parasites, from viruses, fungi and bacteria, to other plants, insects and mites. Plant galls are often highly organized structures so that the cause of the gall can often be determined without the actual agent being identified. This applies particularly to insect and mite plant galls. The study of plant galls is known as cecidology.
Hibiscus is a genus of flowering plants in the mallow family, Malvaceae. The genus is quite large, comprising several hundred species that are native to warm temperate, subtropical and tropical regions throughout the world. Member species are renowned for their large, showy flowers and those species are commonly known simply as "hibiscus", or less widely known as rose mallow. Other names include hardy hibiscus, rose of sharon, and tropical hibiscus.
Tilia is a genus of about 30 species of trees or bushes, native throughout most of the temperate Northern Hemisphere. The tree is known as linden for the European species, and basswood for North American species. In Britain and Ireland they are commonly called lime trees, although they are not related to the citrus lime. The genus occurs in Europe and eastern North America, but the greatest species diversity is found in Asia. In Chinese, "椴/duàn" or "椴樹/duànshù" is a general term for Tilia species. Under the Cronquist classification system, this genus was placed in the family Tiliaceae, but genetic research summarised by the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group has resulted in the incorporation of this genus, and of most of the previous family, into the Malvaceae.
Tilia platyphyllos, the large-leaved lime or large-leaved linden, is a species of flowering plant in the family Malvaceae (Tiliaceae). It is a deciduous tree, native to much of Europe, including locally in southwestern Great Britain, growing on lime-rich soils. The common names largeleaf linden and large-leaved linden are in standard use throughout the English-speaking world except in the British Isles, where it is known as large-leaved lime. The name "lime", possibly a corruption of "line" originally from "lind", has been in use for centuries and also attaches to other species of Tilia. It is not, however, closely related to the lime fruit tree, a species of citrus.
Cytisus scoparius, the common broom or Scotch broom, is a deciduous leguminous shrub native to western and central Europe. In Britain and Ireland, the standard name is broom; this name is also used for other members of the Genisteae tribe, such as French broom or Spanish broom; and the term common broom is sometimes used for clarification. In other English-speaking countries, the most common name is "Scotch broom" ; however, it is known as English broom in Australia.
Viburnum opulus, the guelder-rose or guelder rose is a species of flowering plant in the family Adoxaceae native to Europe, northern Africa and central Asia.
A Shakespeare garden is a themed garden that cultivates some or all of the 175 plants mentioned in the works of William Shakespeare. In English-speaking countries, particularly the United States, these are often public gardens associated with parks, universities, and Shakespeare festivals. Shakespeare gardens are sites of cultural, educational, and romantic interest and can be locations for outdoor weddings.
Verticillium wilt is a wilt disease affecting over 350 species of eudicot plants. It is caused by six species of Verticillium fungi: V. dahliae, V. albo-atrum, V. longisporum, V. nubilum, V. theobromae and V. tricorpus. Many economically important plants are susceptible including cotton, tomatoes, potatoes, oilseed rape, eggplants, peppers and ornamentals, as well as others in natural vegetation communities. Many eudicot species and cultivars are resistant to the disease and all monocots, gymnosperms and ferns are immune.
Campanula rapunculus, common name rampion bellflower, rampion, rover bellflower, or rapunzel, is a species of bellflower (Campanula) in the family Campanulaceae.
Rosa'KORbin' is a white floribunda rose cultivar bred by Kordes in Germany in 1958. It is also known as Iceberg, Fée des Neiges and Schneewittchen. 'KORbin' is among the world's best known roses.
The surname Scales has more than one possible origin.
Akehurst is an old English name derived from "ake," meaning oak, and "hurst," meaning "a grove of trees." The name likely comes from the modern town of Oakhurst, once called "Acersc." The name is primarily found in the Sussex area of England.
The Rose and the Amaranth is one of Aesop's Fables, numbered 369 in the Perry Index. It stands in contrast to those plant fables like The Oak and the Reed and The Trees and the Bramble in which the protagonists arrogantly debate with each other. But in this story, the lowly amaranth praises the rose for its beauty and reputation and is answered, equally humbly, that a rose's life is brief while the amaranth is everlasting.
A toponymic surname or topographic surname is a surname derived from a place name, which included names of specific locations, such as the individual's place of origin, residence, or lands that they held, or, more generically, names that were derived from regional topographic features. Some toponymic surnames originated as personal by-names that later were used as hereditary family names.
Yaxley is an English toponymic surname, which along with dialectal variants, Yexley, Yoakley, Yockley, and Yokley, may derive from any of the English places that bore this name, including Yaxley, Cambridgeshire and Yaxley, Suffolk. "Yacksley" is a variant form.
Theophrastus's Enquiry into Plants or Historia Plantarum was, along with his mentor Aristotle's History of Animals, Pliny the Elder's Natural History and Dioscorides's De materia medica, one of the most important books of natural history written in ancient times, and like them it was influential in the Renaissance. Theophrastus looks at plant structure, reproduction and growth; the varieties of plant around the world; wood; wild and cultivated plants; and their uses. Book 9 in particular, on the medicinal uses of plants, is one of the first herbals, describing juices, gums and resins extracted from plants, and how to gather them.
An animal epithet is a name used to label a person or group, by association with some perceived quality of an animal. Epithets may be formulated as similes, explicitly comparing people with the named animal, as in "he is as sly as a fox", or as metaphors, directly naming people as animals, as in "he is a [sly] fox". Animal epithets may be pejorative, of negative character, or positive, indicating praise.
On 14 October 2022, the British tabloid newspaper the Daily Star began a livestream of an iceberg lettuce next to a framed photograph of Liz Truss, who had recently been appointed the prime minister of the United Kingdom. This act followed an opinion piece in The Economist that compared the expected brevity of Truss's premiership to the shelf life of a head of lettuce, with the October 2022 United Kingdom government crisis occurring just weeks into her tenure and leading many political commentators to opine that Truss's resignation would be imminent. She announced her resignation as prime minister on 20 October 2022, before the lettuce had wilted; the Daily Star subsequently declared the lettuce "victorious" over Truss.
Amongst ~45.3k results for "English rose" "Gemma Arterton"
[Subtitle:] It's beyond be-leaf but Vladimir Putin's spies hacked wet lettuce's phone during the Tory leadership campaign for Russia to gain access to sensitive security information, according to sources
Take away the ten days of mourning after the death of Queen Elizabeth II, and she had seven days in control. That is roughly the shelf-life of a lettuce.