Tulipmania Art Journal
A collection of remarkable facts about tulips
The most expensive tulip bulb in history costed as much as the finest house on the most fashionable Amsterdam canal
This rare bulb was a Semper Augustus tulip and in January 1637 its price reached 10,000 guilders. As Mike Dash, the author of “Tulipomania” puts it, it was “sufficient to purchase one of the grandest homes on the most fashionable canal in Amsterdam, complete with a coach house and an 80-ft (25-m) garden”.
Semper Augustus tulip. Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons
The first tulip growing in Europe was recorded in the city of Augsburg, Germany
In the spring of 1559, the Swiss botanist Conrad Gesner saw the tulip flowering for the first time, while visiting the garden of the magistrate…
At the beginning of the 17th century noblewomen in France wore rare tulips on their décolletages instead of jewellery
As surprising as it may sound, before taking over Holland, the tulip gained popularity in France, causing a mini version of the tulip mania there,…
It takes 6 years to grow a tulip from a seed
Even though we are used to perceiving tulips as bulbous plants, they can also propagate by seeds. It is a quite lengthy process though, and…
A stylised tulip, enciphering the word “Allah”, represents the national emblem of Iran and is featured on the Iranian flag
Originating from Persia and being called “laleh” – “Flower of God” in Persian, in spite of its expatriation and naturalisation across the world, the tulip…