House and Garden 
rose-merchants. They possibly used glass 
houses for the more delicate kinds— 
Condita sic puro numerantur lilia vitro. 
Sic prohibet teneras gemma latere rosas, 
—so as to save them from frost. The 
culture of roses commenced in February. 
Of the various species raised, the Campanian 
was the earliest; later appeared the scented 
Milesian rose and the rose of Palestrina; 
while the Carthaginian roses bloomed every 
month and were called “monthly roses.” 
For its sweet, powerful oil, the rose of 
Cyrene was highly esteemed, and the twice- 
flowering little roses of Psestum held great 
favor. 
At first the Romans possessed but three 
or four sorts; the wild hedge-rose, the 
musk-rose, the pimpernel-leaved rose and 
the Gallica. In Pliny’s day, however, he 
is able to enumerate ten varieties of garden- 
rose, having for coloring white, light pink, 
crimson and yellow. Zell points out how 
much they were given to -planting roses, 
by referring to sums of money given by 
grateful children to celebrate the return of 
their parents (after travel) by the planting 
of a new rose. A soldier also gives money 
to plant a rose on the day he returned from 
the war. In a will a bequest is made by 
the testator that three myrtles and three 
roses be planted upon each successive anni¬ 
versary of his birthday. Tacitus tells us that 
the deservedly ill-fated Vitellius beheld the 
dreadful battle-field of Bedriacum, near Cre¬ 
mona, strewn with laurels and roses. It 
was the custom to sprinkle the ashes of the 
departed with wine, incense and rose leaves 
before placing them in the funeral urn. 
The graves of relations were most religiously 
decked out with roses —“purpureoscjue jacit 
jiores ,”—and on the 23d of May was cele¬ 
brated each year a rose-feast for the departed. 
It finished with a banquet in which roses 
were distributed to each of the partakers, 
and these were, presently, thrown upon the 
tombs. And this fete des roses appears to 
have maintained its influence until it passed 
into Christian usage. 
I here were in actual fact four days in the 
year upon which the flower-gardens were 
heavily taxed for supplies—“ solemnia sacri- 
ficia ;” (1) Birthday; (2) Parentalia (Febru¬ 
ary 13)5 (3) Rosalia \ (4) Dies violas. The 
outsides of all the monuments were adorned 
on these occasions with roses and violets, 
while the lamps were lit within them. There 
is a sarcophagus in the Capitoline Museum, 
whereon the Genius of Life holds in her 
hand a wreath of roses. 
Again, in ordinary life the joy of roses 
entered largely ; for the cushions were filled 
with rose-leaves in the triclinia , and the 
floor was often strewn with them. 
Nero caused roses to pour with rare per¬ 
fumes from the vault of the banqueting-hall 
in his “ golden house ” upon his guests. 
Lampridius tells us, in his Life of Helio- 
gabalus , that the beds and pavements of the 
palace (Flavian) were strewn with flowers— 
violets, lilies, hyacinths, narcissi and roses— 
when Heliogabalus feasted; and from this 
to suffocating his guests with them was per¬ 
haps no very great step. A little later, the 
Emperor Carinus (281 a.d.) had caravans 
of roses from Milan; while in the south 
whole shiploads of them were wafted con¬ 
tinually across the sea from Alexandria and 
New Carthage. It is pleasant to fancy our¬ 
selves falling in the track of one of those 
vessels at night upon the starlit sea. These 
must surely have been dried roses and their 
leaves! 
Moreover, the rose was regarded as the 
symbol of reserve or silence, or typical of 
the secrecy of a trusted friend. The Antho- 
logia Latina contains an epigram regarding 
the “ Intercourse of Persons in Love,” 
and it is said that a custom “ sometimes ” 
prevailed of suspending a rose above the 
company. This action was intended to 
show that what was uttered there must not 
pass outside ; hence the phrase “ sab rosa." 
At Baiae, when people went out on water- 
parties, they used even to sprinkle the sea 
with roses, as if it were the path of the God 
of Love. 
But the adoration of the rose did not end 
here! 11 was used by the maitres de cuisine with 
quinces as an essence for delicate dishes. 
Apicius even made rose-soufflees and rose- 
salads. The globules of dew were swept off 
roses with a bird’s feather and mixed with 
wines and liqueurs. Pliny gives a recipe for 
rose wine, and baths of rose wine and absinthe 
were a vicious novelty introduced by the 
Syrian Heliogabalus. 
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