Curtis Botanical Magazine Plate 278 - Lilium candidum (White Lily) | Original Hand-Colored Print

Original hand-colored antique botanical print from Curtis's Botanical Magazine - Plate 278, Lilium candidum (White Lily).

• Plate: 278
• Latin name: Lilium candidum
• Common name: White Lily
• Native region: Palestine and Syria
• Flowering: July
• Flower colour: White
• Linnaean class / order: Hexandria / Monogynia
• Medium: Original hand-colored engraving (physical print, not a reproduction)

Original Curtis text
Transcribed from the plate's accompanying description page:

[ 278 ]

LILIUM CANDIDUM. WHITE LILY.

. . .

Class and Order.
HEXANDRIA MONOGYNIA.

Generic Character.
Cor. 6-petala, campanulata: linea longitudinali nectarifera. Capsf. valvulis pilo cancellato connexis.

Specific Character and Synonyms.
LILIUM candidum foliis sparsis, corollis campanulatis, intus glabris. Linn. Sp. Pl. ed. 3. p. 433. Syst. Vegetab. ed. 14. p. 14. Murr. p. 324. Abh. Kew. v. 2. p. 429. LILIUM album flore erectio et vulgare. Bauh. Pin. 76. LILIUM album vulgare. The ordinary White Lily. Park. Parad. p. 39. t. 37. f. 4. We may rank the White Lily among the very oldest inhabitants of the flower-garden; in the time of GERARD it was very generally cultivated, and doublefs at a much earlier period; a plant of such statelinefs, so shewy, so fragrant, and at the same time so much disposed to increafe, would of courfe foon be found very generally in gardens, into which its introduction would be accelerated on another account; it was regarded as a plant of great efficacy; among other extraordinary powers attributed to it, we are gravely told that it taketh away the wrinkles of the face. LINNÆUS makes it a native of Palestine and Syria; Mr. AITON of the Levant. Its bloffoms, which open early in July, continue about three weeks, and when they go off leave the flower-garden greatly thinned of its inhabitants. Of the White Lily there are three principal varieties: 1. With double flowers. 2. With flowers blotched with purple. 3. With ftriped leaves, or leaves edged with yellow. The two first of thefe are to be efteemed merely as curiosities; in the third the plant acquires an acceffion of beauty which it has not originally; though many perfons object to variegated leaves,

This print comes from our Curtis archive (via the Royal Horticultural Society and Wheldon & Wesley). Sold as an original historic plate - please review photos for condition.