Step 8 La saggezza del colore

Nella cultura cinese, il colore lavanda, è un colore con proprietà particolari: rappresenta l'armonia dell'universo, poiché è una combinazione del rosso e del blu (rispettivamente Yin e Yang).
                    

Forgiveness is the smell that lavender gives out when you tread on it
                                                                                                                   
                                                                                                   ——Mark Twain         



 ‘Hot lavender, mints, savory, marjoram; The marigold, that goes to bed wi’ the sun, and with him rise weeping.’
                                                                                                     ——Shakespeare
‘

As Rosemary is to the Spirit, so Lavender is to the Soul.‘
                                                                                                       ——Anonymous

“La vita comincia da qualche parte con il profumo alla lavanda” ♡

                                                                                                          (André Aciman)

Lavender has a long literary past. With a fine fragrance, medicinal and culinary value, and a history of favor at court, lavender waxes poetic in these memorable quotes and passages:

Lavender and Culpeper
(The Complete Herbal, 1652)

Being an inhabitant almost in every garden, it is so well known, that it needs no description.

Lavender and John Gerard
(Herball, 1597)

The floures of Lavender picked from the knaps, I meane the blew part and not the husk, mixed with Cinnamon, Nutmeg, and Cloves, made into powder, and given to drinke in the distilled water thereof, doth helpe the panting and passion of the heart, previaleth against giddinesse, turning or swimming of the brain, and members subject to the palsie.

French Lavander hath a body like Lavander, short and of woodie substance, but slenderer, beset with long narrow leaves, of a whitish colour, lesser than those of Lavender, it hath in the top bushe or spikie heads, well compact or thrust together, out the which grow forth small purple flowers or a pleasant smell. The seede is small and blackish: The roote is harde and woodie.

Lavender and Alice Hoffman
(Practical Magic )

There's a few things I've learned in life: always throw salt over your left shoulder, keep rosemary by your garden gate, plant lavender for good luck, and fall in love whenever you can.

Lavender and Shakespeare
(Winter's Tale, iv. 4)

Hot lavender, mints, savory, marjoram;

The marigold, that goes to bed wi' th' sun,
And with him rises weeping; these are flow'rs
Of middle summer, and I think they are given
To men of middle age.

Lavender and Clement Robinson
(Handefull of Pleasant Delites, 1584)

Lavender is for lovers true, Which evermore be faine; Desiring always for to have Some pleasure for their paine: And when that they obtained have The love that they require, Then have they all their perfect joie, And quenched is the fire.

Lavender and Turner
(Herbal, 1545)

I judge that the flowers of lavender quilted in a cappe and dayly worn are good for all diseases of the head that come of a cold cause and that they comfort the braine very well.

Lavender and Tennyson
(Ode to Memory, 1830)

                                

Il viola come lavanda è il colore dei paramenti sacri usati durante la Quaresima. Nel medioevo venivano vietati, proprio in quel periodo, tutti i tipi di rappresentazioni teatrali e di spettacoli pubblici che si tenevano per le vie o le piazze delle città. Ciò comportava per gli attori e per tutti coloro che vivevano di solo teatro notevoli disagi. Non potendo lavorare, le compagnie teatrali non avevano neanche i mezzi per procurarsi il pane quotidiano, ed erano costrette a tirare la cinghia.

Questo è il motivo per cui il colore viola è odiato da tutti gli artisti, in generale, ma è vietato soprattutto in teatro dove con il passare dei secoli è diventato vera e propria superstizione.