Jasmine is a shrub?

November 20, 2010 7:30 PM

Novel Filter: If I were a lady living in the late 1600s in Venice and you were a gentleman wishing to woo me and we could only meet at night what type of (night-blooming) flowers would you bring me?

Additional info that may not be pertinent:
I am not so secretly planning to kill you, but maybe not tonight.
You know this.

Happy NaNo!

posted by ilikecookies to Grab Bag (6 answers total)

Jasmine. You bought it from a merchant in Venice who got it from a ship that sailed from Egypt.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 7:37 PM on November 20, 2010 [1 favorite]

Best answer: How about evening primrose? It blooms in the evening, its meaning in Victorian flower language means "inconstancy" which might be a clever little hint at "I am not so secretly planning to kill you, but maybe not tonight," and according to wikipedia, it arrived in Padua Italy in 1614, not far from Venice!
posted by platinum at 8:13 PM on November 20, 2010 [3 favorites]

On a whim I just looked up the definition of inconstancy, and it said "unfaithfulness by virtue of being unreliable or treacherous." If "I am not so secretly planning to kill you, but maybe not tonight" isn't treacherous, I don't know what is!
posted by platinum at 10:38 PM on November 20, 2010

Lilies, white lilies which put out their evening scent for moths. Lilies were often thought of as funeral flowers, too.
posted by anadem at 11:06 PM on November 20, 2010

Response by poster: I like the idea of both the evening primrose, but it is I, the lady, who may kill the gentleman, not the other way around. :)
posted by ilikecookies at 5:47 AM on November 21, 2010

Best answer: Tuberose: a beautiful, fragrant night bloomer whose flower meaning is "dangerous pleasure."
posted by Morrigan at 12:34 PM on November 21, 2010