Consider the Lilies
The perfectly symmetrical and perfumed white blooms of Lilium candidum have been soothing the human soul for millennia. Bronze-age Minoans in the eastern Mediterranean depicted them in remarkable wall-paintings and, later, in the early days of Christianity, they came to symbolise the purity of the Virgin Mary. A stem of what was later dubbed the ‘Madonna lily’ is held by the archangel Gabriel in many a mediaeval depiction of the Annunciation.
Much as we enjoy flowers for their aesthetic qualities, they have evolved to bear seeds. An aspiring botanist wishing to learn about the reproductive parts of a flowering plant would do well to start by looking at a lily flower with its prominent central female style ending in a sticky stigma surrounded by
