MYTHOLOGY, AND HISTORY OF THE PEONY 



Plowman — a popular allegorical poem, written 

 about 1375 — a priest asks a poor woman: 



" * Hast thou ought in thy purs*, quod he 

 ' Any hote spices ? ' 

 *I have peper and piones' (peonies) quod 



she,' and a pounde garlike, 

 * A ferthyngworth of fenel seed, for fastyng 

 dayes.' " 



In another poem of the same century, entitled 

 ** The Pearl," the flowers around an arbour are 

 described : 



" I entered in that arber grene 



In augeoste in a high seysoun 

 ****** 



Shadowed this wortes ful schyre (bright) 



and schere 

 Gilofre (clove-pinks) gingure (tansy) and 



groomylyon (gromwell) 

 And pyonys powdered ay betwene." 



It thus appears that at this early day the use 

 of the peony in the hardy border had begun. 



In 1484, about 300 years after Necham, the 

 Herbarius credited to Arnoldus de Villanova was 

 published on the Continent. This book contains 

 probably the first printed picture of the peony — 

 a wood-cut in which flowers, leaves and roots are 



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