The plants are hardy herbaceous perennials with narrow tufted radical leaves and an elongated stem bearing a handsome spike of white or yellow flowers.Asphodelus albus andA. fistulosus have white flowers and grow from 45 to 60 centimetres (1+1⁄2–2 ft) high;A. ramosus is a larger plant, the large white flowers of which have a reddish-brown line in the middle of each segment.[6]
Asphodelus fistulosusL. – Onion-leaved asphodel, also known as Onionweed – Mediterranean (naturalized in New Zealand, Mexico, southwestern United States, etc.)
Asphodelus tenuifoliusCav. – Southeast Europe and northern Africa from the Mediterranean south to Mali, Chad, Sudan, Somalia; south-central Asia from Caucasus to India
The leaves[clarification needed] are used to wrapburrata, an Italian cheese. The leaves and the cheese last about the same time, three or four days, and thus fresh leaves are a sign of a fresh cheese, while dried out leaves indicate that the cheese is past its prime.[10]
InGreek legend the asphodel is one of the most famous of the plants connected with the dead and theunderworld.Homer describes it as covering the great meadow (ἀσφόδελος λειμών), the haunt of the dead. It was planted ongraves, and is often connected withPersephone, who appears crowned with a garland of asphodels.[citation needed] Its general connection with death is due no doubt to the greyish colour of its leaves and its yellowish flowers, which suggest the gloom of the underworld and the pallor of death. The roots were eaten by the poorer Greeks; hence such food was thought good enough for the shades.[citation needed] The asphodel was also supposed to be a remedy for venomoussnake-bites and a specific againstsorcery; it was fatal to mice, but preserved pigs from disease. TheLibyannomads made their huts of asphodel stalks.[citation needed][11]
The asphodel is mentioned by several poets in connection with the mythology of death, and by association, the afterlife - specifically theIsles of the Blessed andElysium - part of the ancient Greek concept of the afterlife.
Conrad Aiken: "Snowflake on asphodel—how clear, how bright / Snow's death on dying flower, yet both immortal"
Elizabeth Barrett Browning: "As one who stands in dewless asphodel, Looks backward on the tedious time he had In the upper life."
Florence Earle Coates: "beauty wove a magic spell/ For him, and early, at his need,/ Upon a bed of asphodel/ He found a tuneful reed" in poem "Henry Wadsworth Longfellow"
Leonard Cohen: "But in his lapel, discreetly, he wore a sprig of asphodel."
William Faulkner: "There asphodels are scattered through the night, Like ghosts of young beseeching hands." ONE WHO WAS LEFT LIVING, CHANSONS AU PRINTEMPS, handwritten with drawings, 1919, W. Faulkner, RFC
Robert Frost: “And where they sought without the sword/ Wide fields of asphodel fore’er” The Trial by Existence, A Boy’s Will
Hesiod: "Children! They know not how much more the half is than the whole, nor how great is the profit in mallow and asphodel."[12]
Homer: "So I said and off he went, the ghost of the great runner, Aeacus’ grandson loping with long strides across the fields of asphodel, triumphant in all I had told him of his son, his gallant, glorious son."[13]
Ezra Pound, "Canto XXI": "Danced there Athame, danced, and there Phaethusa/ With colour in the vein,/ Strong as with blood drink, once,/ With colour in the vein/ Red in the smoke-faint throat. Dis caught her up./ And the old man went on there/ beating his mule with an asphodel."
Alfred Tennyson: "Others in Elysian valleys dwell, Resting weary limbs at last on beds of asphodel."
Orville E. Watson: "see a river like Kokosing, in meadows sweet with asphodel"
Marie Laforêt: "Je t'ai donné mes bouquets d'asphodèles
Oscar Wilde: "The heavy fields of scentless Asphodel, the loveless lips with which men kiss in hell"; "they sleep, they sleep, beneath the rocking trees where asphodel and yellow lotus twine"
Dani Filth: "When the Sun goes out our powers/ Will extend throughout Heaven like Asphodel"
Virginia Woolf: " But some were early infected by a germ said to be bred of the pollen of the asphodel" (describing the love of literature inOrlando)
Media related toAsphodelus at Wikimedia Commons
