Flowers for Mary, part II

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I posted a Flowers for Mary post ages ago, and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve referred to it since then in consultations and my own research for other things. And — breaking news! — I just now clicked on the link I refer to in the post, in order to give some examples of the great names there, and it says Forbidden! What! I’ll have to dig deeper on this, but in the meantime, the actual reason I started writing the post (providential timing!) was to direct your attention to this infographic:

MaryGarden

from Catholic Extension (infographic used with permission).

How great is this resource?? I’ve suggested Lily, Rose, and Violet a million times as Marian names, and I love the descriptions of their Marian connections here.

And I was so excited to see Daisy as being a Marian flower — I hadn’t ever seen that, and I’m forever going on about how Daisy is such a great nickname for Margaret — I LOVE the idea of a Margaret nicked Daisy being able to claim St. Margaret and Our Lady as patrons!! (I’ve already made a Marian connection with the name Pearl, which is what Margaret means, and the Irish Margaret — Mairead — is so similar to the Irish Mary — Maire … I’m leaning really close to calling Margaret a Marian name!)

I’ve also seen Marigold connected to the Crowning of Our Lady (Mary’s Gold), and of course I love all these ideas for an actual garden of flowers and other plants (not just a garden of blooms of the baby variety ☺).

What’s your favorite floral Marian name?

31 thoughts on “Flowers for Mary, part II”

  1. I was so excited to find out that Violet was a Marian name — at the time we named our daughter Violet, we had no idea (she was named after my grandmother). Since my oldest’s middle name is Mary, that means both of our daughters have Marian names!

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  2. One of my best of friends is due to having a baby Violet any day now! So excited for her!

    My favorite Marian flower would be Lily. Also love Carmel which is a Marian name and a flower name of sorts since it means “garden”.

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  3. Almost every flower can be linked to Marian connection – at least older ones anyway! That U of Dayton Marian Library has so much info on Mary Gardens and flowers. In the last year they have really made changes to the website and I find it very hard to navigate now and all the old links I had are bad also. That info is still there, just now super hard to find. I will dig some when I have time later.

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  4. Oh this makes me so happy! We just converted this year and our kids are named Owen, Violet and Eliza- we’ve got some good saintly connections with Owen and Eliza but I had no idea about the Mary connection for Violet! So exciting! (And if we have more kids…I am totally going to need ideas on names that fit the style we already have but also have Catholic meanings! I think about this a lot so I love your blog!!!)

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  5. Our daughter’s middle name is “Amaranth.” We did kind of consider it a Marian name because of the fact that “mara” was part of the name. Also, it’s mentioned in Dante and Milton that amaranths grew in the Garden of Eden under the Tree of Life.

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  6. Not quite answering the question but related – my husband always thought it would be awesome if someone used “Agnes Daisy” for their daughter.

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  7. I love this! Rose has always been my fav (it’s my middle name, how can it not be?), but I loved reading that the Tulip is “Mary’s prayer. My mom always had tulips in the yard and they always bring me back to my childhood when I see them now.

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  8. There is obviously something funky going on with the U Dayton Mary pages right now – more that what I have seen, so maybe are currently working on them. Hope it is all up again soon. Such a great resource.

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  9. Another flower Marian name connection (though I think it’s technically a flowering bush) is the Rose of Sharon. When we moved to our current home I was thrilled to find out that the name of the one and only pretty bush in our yard had a Marian connection! (“I am the Rose of Sharon, the lily of the valleys.” Song of Songs 2:1) though Sharon may not be a popular name at the moment, it might be a neat connection for any Sharons out there!! 🙂

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