Note 4 — ITALIAN

“Double roses, pink or red, were the symbol of divine love and were consecrated to the Madonna. One of her titles was the Madonna della Rosa, doubtless based on the verse in the Song of Solomon (ii. 1)—‘I am the Rose of Sharon and the lily of the valleys’—for as early as the first centuries the Fathers of the Church applied to the Madonna the imagery of the Canticles. The tradition is that when the roses were massed together in garlands or baskets they symbolized heavenly joys. The painters of Central Italy during the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries represented clusters of lilies and roses in the foreground of their Madonna pictures as votive offerings to her of sacred flowers. Often angels present bowls of flowers to her.

“Myrtle was one of the Madonna’s flowers and symbolized her purity and other virtues. The jasmine, though not strictly a sacred flower, is often found in religious paintings—the star-shaped blossom apparently symbolized divine hope or heavenly joy. It is often found with roses and lilies beside the Madonna. The carnation had no definite symbolic meaning, but was frequently used instead of the rose; then it had the same significance as the rose, the symbol of divine love, sacred to the Madonna.—Mediæval and Renaissance Paintings (Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 1927).