Presenting

20 June | 2021 IN SEASON '' garden roses Josephine Bonaparte Crowning the Myrtle Tree, by Andrea Appiani the Elder, 1796 Les Roses by Redouté " ere is simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its existence." – Ralph Waldo Emerson T he allure of garden roses is universal. is queen of fl owers has played a major role in poetry, religion, art and literature; music, medicine, fashion design, perfume and home decoration—even cuisine. An ancient fl ower grown for more than 5,000 years throughout Asia before it ever made an appearance in the Western world. More than 30,000 varieties of roses are suggested to be grown across the globe today. e signifi cant breeding of modern times started slowly in Europe, from about the 17th century. A major contributor in the early 19th century was Empress Josephine of France who patronized the development of rose breeding. Empress Josephine Bonaparte, wife of Napoleon, was a passionate rose lover and collector. While her husband was acquiring an empire, she was acquiring property and 250 diff erent roses from all over the world to add to the gardens of Malmaison, her chateau retreat outside Paris. Being Empress had its benefi ts and rewards during war time. e French Navy was enlisted to confi scate any plants or rose seeds from ships at sea and her large purchases from the British nursery Kennedy and Lee were permitted safe passage through the naval blockade. Between 1804 and 1814, Empress Josephine built her rose collection. It was to become the greatest and largest rose collection in the world, unsurpassed until the creation of Sangerhausen, in Germany, and L'Hay-les-Roses, outside Paris, one century later. e famed botanical illustrator Pierre-Joseph Redouté meticulously painted 117 of Josephine's roses in his landmark watercolor book, Les Roses. His renditions are, even today, considered classic references to the diff erences in rose varieties. e rose offi cially became the "National Floral Emblem" of the United States in the fall of 1986, with President Ronald Reagan signing the declaration, which included these sentiments: "Americans have always loved the fl owers with which God decorates our land. More often than any other fl ower, we hold the rose dear as the symbol of life and love and devotion, of beauty and eternity. … We see proof of this everywhere. We grow roses in all our 50 states. We fi nd roses throughout our art, music and literature. We decorate our celebrations and parades with roses. Most of all, we present roses to those we love, and we lavish them on our altars, our civil shrines and the fi nal resting places of our honored dead." To bring order to the wild world of roses, the American Rose Society has classifi ed all roses into two major categories: By Jules Lewis Gibson

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