A brief history of daffodils
Daffodils have been part of my life for as long as I can remember. Born in Hampshire's New Forest, my roots lie deep in the rich soil of southern England, yet my childhood was one of perpetual motion as my family moved from one home to another, prompted by advances in my father's career. Across my ever-changing world, daffodils became a constant. As each winter receded they appeared anew, a radiant signal that the bleakest English season was done with and the New Year truly on its way. By the time I hit my teens, my family's travelling halted and we settled in the countryside a few miles from a Thames Valley village. My new home was surrounded by towering woodland dissected by pathways that had been trod for centuries, dappled meadows carpeted all-too-briefly with bluebells - and each spring what felt like acres of drifting daffodils.
It was then that I absorbed the fact, without ever having to think about it, that the daffodil is not one flower but many. Ours blossomed in a prismatic kaleidoscope of colours, from tissue paper white to the deepest blood orange, and in a melange of flower forms and sizes. Some were elfin, others giants brandishing flowers that ranged in shape: classic golden trumpets, creamy stars with twisting petals, tiny butter-lemon cups. As one daffodil variety melted away, another materialised to take its place, a rhythmic dance through the spring chill that lasted, it seemed to my young mind, for ages. The blossoms were beautiful, injecting a lifeblood of colour into the drained winter landscape and we took them for granted. After all, they were simply daffodils.
'The Daffodil, as grown in our gardens, is a purely English flower.' George Herbert Engleheart, introduction to Daffodil Growing for Pleasure and Profit by Albert F. Calvert, 1929.
Daffodil: Biography of a Flower by Helen O'Neill (Harper Collins, £18.99)
1/9Japanese artist Konan Tanigami (1879-1928) pioneered the depiction of western flowers with the use of traditional woodblocks. This daffodil composition is from Seiyou Sokazufu (Pictorial Album of Western Plants and Flowers: Spring).
2/9'Daffodil with Red Admiral', a 1568 watercolour by Jacques Le Moyne de Morgues (1533-1588), the multitalented French artist and explorer.
3/9Daffodils represented both romance and potential to the Isles of Scilly and beyond, as this vibrant example of 1920s publicity material from the Empire Marketing Board shows.
4/9Spring brings a kaleidoscopic array of daffodils to my mother's garden. Here are a few of the varieties that bloom, as drawn by her.
5/9'Daffodils in Blue and White Jug', a modern-day water colour on paper by Sally Maltby.
6/9This charming nineteenth-century Chinese watercolour of daffodils demonstrates style rather than botanical accuracy.
7/9Buzzing between Narcissus poeticus blooms, a pollinating bee is frozen in action by a seventeenth-century botanical artist.
8/9The intimacy of Narcissus as captured in 'Women at Tea Time' by contemporary American artist Daniel F Gerhartz.
9/9'Flowers Streaked with Gold', dating to about 1911 from Netherlands-born oil painter Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema (1836-1912).
