Plants on Christmas cards – January 6th
Two weeks before Christmas I was persuaded to enter a pub quiz. One of the first questions was “What is the Christmas flower?”. I guessed “Christmas Rose” i.e.Helleborus niger. I was wrong, the ‘correct’ answer was Poinsettia.
The next question came: “When was the first Christmas card produced?” I guessed “1840”. Wrong again, the first commercially-produced Christmas card was 1843.
The first commercial Christmas card by John Callcott Horsley 1843. It features charitable acts: food and clothing are being given to the poor, possibly influenced by Charles Dickens’ novel Christmas Carol, also from 1843. The climbing plant might be ivy. Attribution: wikipedia.
My team didn’t win the quiz, but I was stimulated to take a botanical look at Christmas cards, and to count the poinsettias. We still send and receive cards, and I’ve always enjoyed scrutinising the art-work. Some of them break new ground, others are soppy-sentimental. So this year, I engaged the help of a few friends to make a survey of what botanical interest may have been served up for 2024.
I’ve gathered together data from the first few returns and here is my chart (see below). I’ve plotted all those occurring at least three times. Conifer trees win and robins come second. In third place are deer, cousins of Rudolf, but in most of the images I’ve seen they are not shackled to a sledge. Holly comes only sixth, although cards often bear non-descript sprigs of greenery with red berries.
The frequency of images found on a sample of cards received by (mostly) botanical friends.
There were no poinsettias but various botanical species appear far down the list including horse chestnuts, daffodils, pomegranates and Amanita– these are not very Christmassy although today (January 3rd) I did see a few real daffodils in flower in my garden (the early sort). Horse chestnuts? I think the artist must have mistaken them for sweet chestnuts. Pomegranates? Well, they are in the shops but surely they are not Christmas images. And two examples of Amanita, the only fungus, and redder than a robin’s redbreast….. But no Brussel Sprouts. It seems that red in winter is a necessity to counteract drabness.
On animal life, birds are represented, mostly ones that you can eat. In fact, all the animals are just about edible and some are delicious with a little cranberry sauce. Lagomorphs (hares and rabbits) score well, often running and leaping in the snow. Puffins and Highland Cattle are among the more charismatic creatures, and doves representing peace are a good choice at this time.
Christmas card image by WordPress’s AI assistant.
So why are there no poinsettias? In December 2022 we featured Poinsettia in Plant of the Week (written by Chris Jeffree). It originates from Mexico, where it has been used in Christmas celebrations for hundreds of years. Later, commercial production began in the USA and its world-wide popularity began. You can read Chris’s article here. My guess is that poinsettias are more often Christmas symbols in North America than here.
Who designs Christmas cards? Turn the cards over, and most of them show the name of the artist. The best designs are outstanding, worthy of any gallery. Many of them are kitsch. I wondered how Artificial Intelligence (AI) would perform. I offered the simple brief ‘Christmas card plants’ and within a few seconds my ‘AI artist’ produced a striking image dominated by poinsettia with holly and conifer foliage. The quality is photographic.
AI’s attempt to make a Christmas card featuring deer
Then I entered ‘Christmas card with deer’. Oh dear! The AI program has probably been trained with the cartoons of Walt Disney. The deer’s legs don’t seem right and the rump looks like a kangaroo’s. Moreover, we don’t usually hang Christmas lights in the forest (Nordic people perhaps?). However, some folk might like the image.
AI’s attempt to make a Christmas card featuring the Dove of Peace.
Next up, I tried ‘Christmas card with dove of peace’. Five seconds later, up came an albino pigeon. Hasn’t AI missed the point here? The dove of peace ought to be flying, with a sprig of foliage in its beak, as described in the Bible and the Torah. I much prefer Picasso’s version from the 1949 International Peace Conference in Paris.
We are left thinking that human artists still have a future.
There was a final botanical question in the pub quiz: ‘What is the traditional Christmas Tree”. Easy – but my answer “Norway Spruce” was wrong. The quizmaster said “Nordmann fir”. Well, that may be the popular choice nowadays but it is not the traditional one.
Here are the Christmas plant blogs you may have missed.
Just click on the titles and they will emerge from the archive.
