Paeonia in Mythology

Hey dear Community, first of all I would like to welcome you all to my new post and hope you had a day that brought many positive experiences into your life! In this post, I would like to talk a little about the mythology of a plant and hope you can learn new things.

Here you can see pictures of peonies which are also known under the scientific name Paeonia and it is believed that they have their origin in China where it already decorated the gardens thousands of years ago. In ancient China, it was considered a status symbol and has decorated particularly imperial gardens and was also considered a king among the flowers to which some important symbolic meanings were assigned and it was considered a sign of prosperity or happiness and was particularly often used at ceremonies and also greatly influenced the ancient art in China and can be seen there in murals, porcelain or other works of art. It did not take long for it to find its way to Japan and other Asian countries where more and more varieties have been created and in Europe it became known for the first time by Dutch seafarers who reported about it and a few decades later the first specimens also arrived Europe and it is suspected that it was first grown in England and from there has spread itself across Europe and many breeding varieties have emerged. The botanical name derives from the Greek mythology of the doctor of the gods Paeon who was known for making miraculous healings and was once a student of the Greek god of healing Asclepius and according to legends, he healed the god of the underworld Hades with the help of peonies after he was once wounded by Heracles and there is also a legend that once the Roman goddess of the hunt Diana brought others to life with the help of this plant. It was generally revered as a magical plant which has numerous healing properties and in traditional Chinese medicine the medicinal effect was already known thousands of years ago. Also in Europe it became more and more known because of these characteristics but was often considered controversial because of the toxicity and it was cultivated more and more but to this day in Europe it is rather unknown for these purposes and as always, I would like to mention here that in the event of illness you always have to ask your doctor or pharmacist of trust about the right medicine and use!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you could learn something new about mythology! I captured these pictures with my Camera Sony Alpha 6000 plus 55-210 mm lens.