“After the hell of your desires burns out,
you can sow anything you want like tulips and red roses.
[…] Our hearts are home to a garden of tulips and roses.
One cannot wither or suffer there.”
- Rumi
The tulip is an expression of the loved-one and the symbol of desire, red, and spring. It has been chosen as the symbol of the Republic of Turkey due to the fact that the flower originated from Central Asia and mainly Turkey where over a hundred species grew wild.
The tulip was domesticated by the Ottomans who were fascinated by the shape and various colours. They planted them in vast numbers, and painted them on pottery and glazed tiles which adorns the walls of many Turkish mosques, embroidered them on textiles, carpets, and even created a special glass vase called “Laledan”.
Tulips arrived in Europe in the middle of the 16th century, initially in Antwerp; were met with such adoration that it led to what came to be known as the “Dutch tulip mania”. Within two decades tulips flourished so rapidly all over Europe that “No woman of fashion stepped on to the street without a posy of rare tulips." The flower was named “Tulipa” in Europe, derived from the Turkish word "tulbend" or "turban", which the flower resembled.