Forget-me-not (Myosotis)
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Their story is legendary. According to the Journal Nature (vol XVI, 1877), the etymology of the name goes as follows:
"The forget-me-not was originally the germander speedwell, whose blossoms, falling off and flying 'away as soon as it is plucked, gave emblematic iorce to the name.
It was known in the days of chivalry as the "flower of souvenance," and was embroidered into the collars of the knights, a fact still recalled by its German name Ehrenpreis, prize of honour.
About 200 years ago we find the name given to the ground-pine, Ajuga chanuepitys, whose nauseous taste once realised can never be forgotten.
Finally it was seized upon by the river-side Myosotis, and forthwith sprung up a charming legend, created obviously to suit its latest identification, how that while two lovers loitered by a lake, the maiden saw and longed for the bright blue flowers, the knight plunged in to get them, but, unable to regain the shore, had yet agility enough to fling them into his lady's lap, and then with a last devoted look and the words "forget me not," sank below the waves for ever."
Their sentimental standing as a flowering plant of mostly temperate areas of the Northern Hemisphere takes two forms.
With now over three hundred years of mythology surrounding Myosotis, the first form, positive sentimentality, is understandable.
Both native and non-native myosotis flowers thrive in garden and natural settings throughout most of the United States. Alaska calls one species, Myosotis alpestris, the Alpine Forget-me-not, its official state flower.
The second sentiment notes the ability of some myosotis species to be a bit aggressive and weedy by nature, as if they insist that none forget-them not. More than a couple states label some species as invasive.
© 2009 Patricia A. Michaels