Another encore post, this time, part one of two that I wrote back in February, 2006.
Behold, this crocus is a withering flame…
— Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Barren Spring, 1870
The signs of Spring are becoming increasingly insistent and unmistakable. In my garden, purple and yellow crocuses are opening in the noon sun, before slipping back to sleep again in the freezing night.
According to Greek myth, the handsome mortal Crocus fell in love with the beautiful nymph Smilax. But after an idyllic tryst, Smilax grew tired of him and rebuffed his favors. Grief-stricken, he wasted away until at last, nothing remained of him but the beautiful purple crocus flower. Alternatively, in other tales, Crocus was witness to the death of his beloved Smilax, and the Gods, pitying his grief, turned him into the saffron crocus so that he might live forever.
Another tradition about Crocus refers to the fact that, in the Greek mythos, the Mother Goddess often had a brother, son, or consort who symbolized Her fertility. He was generally associated with some plant that has a season, then dies away or is harvested, only to return the next year. One such fertility daemon was a Spartan youth named Krokos. He was, like many of these Mother Goddess fertility daemons, either bi- or homosexual.
Krokos became the lover of the androgynous God Hermes. But Krokos was mortal and in their rough play together, Hermes accidentally gave his beloved a mortal wound, some said with a discus, others with a quoit. Wherever the blood of Krokos fell, a saffron flower grew, with the three red stigma retaining the color of his blood.
In addition, all crocuses are sacred to Persephone and Demeter.
When Demeter first saw spring’s bright yellow crocuses, She was angered, and demanded to know who had disobeyed Her edict that nothing should grow until Her daughter Persephone was returned to Her side from the Underworld. The crocuses themselves replied, “But the Maiden is coming!”
In eager anticipation, Demeter prepared to greet Her lost daughter by putting on a mantle made of white crocus blossoms. Sure enough, Persephone rose out of the ground in a circle of sunny yellow crocus blooms. These pure yellow crocuses were probably the natural wild Golden Crocus (C. chrysanthus) which is native to Greece, Galacia, and Macedonia. They often bloom even while snow is still upon the ground, long before the start of Spring, and would have been sunny heralds of Persephone’s return.
More tomorrow about the crocus, whose size is diminutive, but whose legend is great.
I know when the little ones pop up their pretty heads from all the snow or muck in the yard, they do give me hope that spring is just a few days away.