Do you LOVE Damasks and their history? :-) Me, too. If it's okay, I'll drop some info here and there as get a sec. There are rose historians on the forum that will have much more to share. Carol

Rose de Rescht

It might be very old and Middle Eastern, or it might be a European rose carried into that area of the world. Quoting Susan Horn in the link below: "Author Brent Dickerson in the classic book, The Old Rose Advisor, speculates that this rose was most probably brought from France to Rescht circa 1807 during the French rapprochement and that it is possibly the red 'Toul-les-Mois'. It was rediscovered near the Iranian provincial capital of Rescht by Miss Nancy Lindsay, an English garden writer and plant collector, in 1945 after the Second World War and was brought back to the United Kingdom, where it was re-introduced around 1950. "

Here's the link to the Santa Clarita Valley Rose Society article.

https://scvrs.homestead.com/RoseDeRescht.html

Yes, Foetida does "stink". The flower has the scent of Linseed Oil. The growth parts, new growth shoots, sepals, ovaries and peduncles smell like Juicy Fruit Gum to my nose. The flower scent is just like that of Fedtschenkoana and R Laxa.

Graham Thomas discovered what earlier Europeans called the musk rose, Rosa moschata, growing in a garden around 1963. Its blooms do seem to resemble images of musk roses from Medieval paintings, etc. This is usually the Rosa moschata offered today, and is not to be confused with Rosa brunonii, the Himalayan musk rose. There's a lot more to say on the musk rose subject, but I'll leave it to our resident historians,

You might want to check out some of the text at the bottom of the Help Me Find pages. Often brief historical descriptions are offered. You might also be interested in Brent DIckerson's The Old Rose Advernturer and The Old Rose Advisor.

Hi portlandmysteryrose! Yes, definitely! : ) I am fascinated with all of the old roses, their history and charm, especially the really ancient ones that have been grown for thousands of years. I was looking through some old posts from a few years back, and I think this quote from bamabutterfly sums it up best: “I kinda think roses are like stars....sometimes when stargazing, I wonder about the people who looked at those stars and what they were thinking (or worrying or happy) about...Roses are like that too, in a way....people who had those same roses, but lived in a different time. I know it sounds corny, but that is what I love about history and it seems to me antique roses are ripe with history, which certainly for me is part of their charm. JMO”

Thank you so much for the info, it’s cleared up a lot of things that I was really confused about, especially the part about the musk roses. I will definitely check out the books you mentioned.

Hi roseseek! That’s really interesting. I wonder why it would smell that way, maybe to attract a certain type of pollinator?

Hi Christopher! Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge with me. You have given me answers to nearly all my questions. I found the part about how R. moschata, R. gallica, and R. fedtschenkoana could have crossed especially helpful. It’s such a shame that R. sancta as in commerce today is not the same as it was all those centuries ago. I had also read that part about how some archaeologist discovered a rose wreath and determined it to be R. sancta after soaking the roses in water. It definitely doesn’t sound like a very credible way to make a rose identification. Although I do remember reading in a book once, I think it was a book about Cleopatra, that the Egyptians had a method where they could preserve rose blossoms to keep them fresh for months. Through the years this method has unfortunately become lost. But I doubt the roses would be identifiable after thousands of years. I wonder if the real R. sancta still exists in Ethiopia. I was reading an old post by Dr. Malcolm Manners when he was taking a trip to Ethiopia and found what could possibly be the real R. sancta. It would be so cool if the real R. sancta could be rediscovered.

Thank you for your help everyone and have a lovely evening,

damask_rose : )

P.S. - I have one more question, does anybody know where R. gallica “Officianlis” came from? Thanks!

Hello everyone! I have one more question: Does anybody know the rose varieties that would have been grown in ancient Assyria? Thanks!

damask_rose : )

I am glad to find other Damask lovers. Damasks have been my favorite since I first saw Autumn Damask in bloom. Some say that Autumn Damask is an ancient and naturally-occurring cross and is the rose responsible for Vergil's "twice blooming rose gardens of Paestum." Herodotus (5th century BC) also mentioned a rose that bloomed more than once. I like to thinkthis rose predates Doug Seidel's story by centuries.

I am especially interested in true Damasks. I have four, possibly five--Autumn Damask, Quatre Saisons Blanc Mousseux, Kazanlik, and a mystery rose I received from Pickering (supposed to have been York & Lancaster) which produces 2-3 inch pink blooms (same color, fragrance & foliage as AD &Kazanlik) with button eyes. It is one of the first roses to bloom in my garden and like Kazanlik often loses buds to late frosts. Number 5 is the Pickering Royal Four Seasons.

I have grown a few Gallica seedlings all of which except one are indistinguishable to my eye from Officinalis, although I think that Conditorum is the seed parent of at least one of them. The remaining seedling has produced red, velvety flowers for two years straight; Rosa Mundi was the seed parent and I suspect the pollen came from Conditorum which it resembles. Not exactly breeding true, but not far from the mark either.

I had a similar experience with my Musk seedling. Seed parent was a double musk which also bears single blooms; the seedling has only singles but, as far as I can tell, is identical in every other respect to the double musk. They grow side by side for easy comparison.

Lindsey

lplantagenet7AVA -- If you have 'Conditorum' in your garden, could you please contact Belmont (Dennis)? He's been searching for it for years.

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/4669958/desperately-seeking-conditorum#n=4

:-)

~Christopher

Christopher,

I see that he wants cuttings or suckers. I have neither to give at this point. My original grafted plant died but not before I rooted a cutting, however, the cutting declined gradually perhaps because I added too much mulch when planting and it sank below ground level. In February I used a shovel to raise it. Although It didn't bloom this spring, I see a new cane just starting and hope it will grow stronger and larger this summer.

Lindsey

Hi Lindsey! I'm so happy to find fellow damask lovers too! I really want to get Autumn Damask and Kazanlik, and maybe Gloire de Guilan. I hope they are in stock this fall at High Country Roses. I wonder how old Autumn Damask really is. It is so cool that it was mentioned by Vergil and Herodotus. HelpMeFind lists the date as before 1633, but it has to be much, much older than that. I think Kazanlik is really old too, maybe one of the original seedlings (along with Autumn Damask) from the cross of R. Gallica and R. Moschata all those years ago. Do you know anything about Gloire de Guilan? I read that it is a true damask, but there is not much information on it. I wonder what those damasks from Pickering could possibly be? Maybe true damasks that are no longer in commerce in the U.S.? I wish I could go back in time to see exactly where these roses came from, and the ancient civilizations that grew them. I wonder if anybody has ever repeated the crosses that created the old classes of roses. For instance, if someone today crossed R. Gallica, R. Moschata, and R. Fedstchenkoana, would the offspring be considered damask roses? Or something else entirely? Would they be considered modern roses or antique roses?

Your seedling roses sound really interesting. If people reproduced roses through seed instead of cuttings, that might be why rose nursery's carry different roses under the same name. Kind of like how Pickering Royal Four Seasons is different from the Autumn damask, maybe it is a seedling of it? I wonder where rose nurseries source their plants from. How do they go about finding all these old varieties?

Have a nice evening,

damask_rose : )

I don't have Gloire de Guilan--perhaps someone who does can describe how it differs and to what extent from Kazanlik. I assume that the rose I purchased from Pickering is indeed Kazanlik. I have counted its petals on occasion and they are approximately 30 in number--hence the other name Trigintipetala.

I discovered that my button-eye Damask is being sold as Kazanlik by Rogue Valley. I don't think that can be right--I have never heard that Kazanlik is anything other than an alternative to Trigintipetala and the button-eye has many more than 30 petals..

My Kazanlik has the same ruffled look as Autumn Damask.

Lindsey

Perhaps someone here can identify the button- eye from the picture at Rogue Valley.

Lindsey

It's in stock, too, if anyone wants it.

Lindsey