Why violets come into their own at Easter

The English Rock Garden, the magnum opus of the great gardening writer, horticulturist and plant collector Reginald Farrer, is an indispensable A to Z guide to alpine flowers. When he finally reaches V, Farrer writes: ‘Viola brings this alphabet to the last great dragon in its path.’ But rather than offering fire-breathing terror, he presents a family of flowers containing both beauties and ‘dull and dowdy species’.

There are between 400 and 500 species in the viola family. The sweet violet, while lacking the dark mystery and beauty of its cousin Bowles black, was associated with Aphrodite and became a symbol of both Athens and fertility, which evolved into a Scots tradition of violets being presented to brides on their wedding day in the Athens of the North. The Bonapartes chose the violet as their floral emblem, and it was Empress Marie Louise who established the violet industry in Parma after her separation from Napoleon. They are famously easy to grow and spring up in wild woods, suburban gardens and even terracotta pots from late winter through to early spring in Britain.

One of the most famous literary violas appears in Wordsworth’s poem ‘She Dwelt among the Untrodden Ways’. At the centre
of this evasive articulation of grief are the lines where its subject, Lucy, is translated into: ‘A violet by a mossy stone/ Half hidden from the eye!’

Violets come into their own at Easter; purple is, after all, the colour used to symbolise suffering in the Church. It used to be said that these bold flowers grew up straight until the shadow of the Cross fell upon them and caused them to bow their heads in sorrow.

Yet violets are perhaps more readily thought of as a sweeter pleasure.