ROSE

Original pen and ink artwork by Manitu Okahas.

Healing tonic for maiden to crone
The magic water to intuition
Love, luck, beauty, and abundance
​The garden fairy's attraction

A bit nipped by a late frost, but this hardy little beauty has a home by the front door

The beautiful rose is both ancient and modern at the same time.  Ancient roses have been found in fossils that are 35 million years old.  The first known use of roses is from the 17th century B.C.  The Chinese have been cultivating roses for at least 5000 years.  The oldest living rose is believed to be around 1000 years old.  Depending on the source of the information, there are over 150 named species of rose world wide and as many as 16,000 varieties that are cultivated.  The beauty that lives beside the front door is one of the newer "miniature" varieties.

Many of the wild species are brambly thicket roses with single fragrant flowers and delicious hips.  For most people, however, it is the cultivated roses that come to mind.  Modern show roses that are often purchased for bouquets are bred for the perfection of the buds and long stems, but they tend to be temperamental in the garden and have a lower level of aroma.  The "antique" roses grown by my grandmother were far less "perfect".  When her roses were in bloom, the whole neighborhood was infused with the relaxing aroma.  These were hardy, mostly care free roses with short stems and frilly, less than predictable flowers.  These are the roses that are treasured by both the herbalist and the energy worker.

Along with many of the wild roses, the three species that are normally used by the herbalist are Rosa gallica or French rose, Rosa centifolia or cabbage rose, and Rosa damascera or damask rose. These are used for scent infusion and sometimes for rose hips.  A fourth species, Rosa rugosa is often grown for rose hips.  These four species carry most of the ancient medicinal lore, symbolism, and magic of the rose.

The medicinal legacy of the rose pre-dates the written record, so we can only guess at its early uses, but it seems to be a long laundry list of benefits.  Medieval to modern uses include skin tonic preparations to improve general skin health and treat minor skin issues.  It acts as a general health and energy tonic as rose hips are high in vitamin C,A,D,B,E, and K as well as a number of minerals.  It is also used to help alleviate a number of mild illnesses and the recovery from trauma and stress.  There are more medicinal uses, but beyond a cup of rose hip tea or putting a few petals on your cake or other culinary use, it is best to consult an herbalist.

Roses have long been steeped in the symbolism of love, emotion, feminine mystique, and perfection.  The Queen of flowers has symbolism for each phase of a woman's life from attracting love, maintaining health, to promoting women's wisdom and intuition.  

If you like to speak in the language of flowers, all colors of rose speak to love and emotions in their varying aspects.  White is reverence.  Yellow is joy.  Orange is passion.  Red is love.  Pink is appreciation.

The magical and energetic uses of rose is probably as old as the medicinal uses.  the most common use is to attract love or predict love.  This can be done with rose water, rose hips, or the flowers.  Rose bud tea is used to induce prophetic dreams and feminine intuition.  Using roses in the bath is believed to attract beauty and love.  Roses are also used for protection, good luck, confidence, truth, and abundance.  Oh, and planting roses in the garden puts you in good standing with the fairies.

I remember watching my grandmother make rose water when I was young.  While there are several ways to make rose water, this recipe from wiccanow.com matches my grandmother's rose water the closest.  She used her spicy scented climbing roses for her special brew.
Add 2 cups of rose petals to 3 cups of water in a 6 cup pot.  (She used well water from her hand pump well.)
Simmer, covered until the color has seeped out of the petals.  (About 5 to 20 minutes.)
Leave the lid on the pot and let it cool to room temperature.
Strain and bottle.
It can be stored for up to 2 weeks in the refrigerator for daily use, or it can be frozen as ice cubes.

Enjoy!

Along with my normal sources, I used
magikalspot.com, eluneblue.com, and wiccanow.com
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