Magazine  (1997)  Page(s) 15. No. 14.  
 
Robin Lane Fox. Roses in Classical Times
On my poor Cotswold garden soil, I have probably killed more roses than I have satisfied. Among my successes, I value the two pink roses with Virginiana blood, Rose d'Amour and Rose d'Orsay....

Book  (1987)  Page(s) 141.  
 
Dr. Charles Jeremias. Vice-President. ARS. Native Specie Roses of the U.S.A.
D'Orsay Rose date origin, parentage unknown, identified as being different from Rose d'Amour by G. S. Thomas. Shorter (5 feet) and more branches than 'Rose d'Amour'. The other differences are the prickles; there are pairs of prickles just below each leaf which 'Rose d'Amour' doesn't have.

Book  (1978)  Page(s) 226.  
 
We might hope for a flourishing race from R. virginiana, but it has not yet arrived.

Rose d'Amour' Tall - Pink Late summer Perfume 3. Hips 2. One star recommendation.
This pink rose is semi-double, otherwise it is like R. virginiana, but not so similar as to pass as a variety; it is therefore presumed to be a hybrid, and an attractive one too. Nobody, I think, can be quite sure of disentangling the names involved here. 'Rose d'Amour' is a name going back at least to 1759, and another old name for it is 'St. Mark's Rose' . A similar rose, with narrower leaves and stipules, appeared under the name 'D'Orsay Rose'; presumably in the nineteenth century, although nobody seems to know when. As being a double or at least a semi-double version of R. virginiana, 'Rose d' Amour' was for a long time sold as R. virginiana plena, until the authorities substituted the name R. x rapa. Graham Thomas confesses that for some years, until he noticed they were different and segregated them, he had 'D'Orsay Rose' and' Rose d' Amour' mixed under the name R. virginiana plena. I have an even graver confession: my own firm, alert to the new name, but indifferent to the hybrid symbol, was selling R. rapa until I pointed out that what we had was actually R. virginiana. Jean Gaujard of France put the cap on it all by introducing in 1936 a Hybrid Tea called' Rose d' Amour'. If we stir in the old botanical names of R. lucida and R. lucida plena, we have all the clues and little clarity. Rapa alludes to a small turnip, and describes the shape of the hips.

Book  (1977)  Page(s) 27.  
 
Graham Stuart Thomas. The Rose 'd'Amour and the 'D'Orsay Rose', Hybrids of Rosa virginiana.
Years ago I grew the first of these two roses under the name of Rosa virginiana plena.Considerably later I was given the second. As young plants in the nursery they resembled each other so much that they became mixed and in my book Shrub Roses of Today, 1962, I stated that they were synonymous. Since then I have had more opportunity to compare them partly because an old plant at Hidcote, with increased attention and cultivation, started to flower again, and there is no doubt that the two plants are distinct. In my book, the pencil drawing facing page 49, entitled 'Rose d'Amour', is in reality the 'D'Orsay Rose'; this is here reproduced together with a drawing of the true 'Rose d'Amour' from blooms collected at Wisley, where it grows splendidly as a climber on the wall of the Aberconway hostel. Further, it is not such a great step from the quality and size of the blooms from Wisley to the painting in Vol. II of Redoute: Les Roses, plate 7; I think they are one and the same rose. Redoute calls it R. rapa; with the synonym Rosier Turneps; he places it in his group Rosae turbinatae, to which belong also the Frankfort roses (Rosa francofurtana 'Agatha' and the plant we grow as 'Empress Josephine') but these are not generally considered to be related to the American species R. virginiana.
All these roses have however one marked character, the very wide receptacle - or young hep - below the flowers; it widens for most of its length, suddenly narrowing slightly to where the lobes of the calyx grow from it, and for this reason is likened to a top or turnip, echoed again in rapum, the Latin for small turnip.
The 'D'Orsay Rose' and its name - which I have been unable to trace anywhere - came from the late Miss Nancy Lindsay and may well have been obtained from the plant at Hidcote. According to her this rose was a favourite with the Comte D'Orsay, a famous dandy of the first half of the 19th century: he liked it for a buttonhole. For this purpose a bud of it or of 'Rose d'Amour' are equally suited, being particularly shapely.
It will be seen from the two drawings that while the flowers of the two roses resemble each other, the foliage and stipules of the 'D'Orsay Rose' are much narrower than those of 'Rose d'Amour', though they both have broad bracts and both flower for a long time, usually after I July in our country. (In Venice 'Rose d'Amour' is apparently known as 'St Mark's Rose and Ellen Willmott in The Genus Rosa states that it is expected to flower on St Mark's Day, 25 April; further that it was introduced by Philip Miller in 1768. This last fact I have been unable to verify, but it is in the 1759 edition of his The Gardener's Dictionary.)
The 'D'Orsay Rose' - since we have no other name for it - is a fairly erect bush up to some 5 ft with rather light, somewhat leaden-green leaves. 'Rose d' Amour' makes very long shoots, has rich green leaves with marked red staining on the leafstalks and stipules and will ascend to 10 ft or so on a wall; it is lax growing, and bears considerable resemblance to R. virginiana, but is pretty certainly a hybrid. The 'D'Orsay Rose' has pairs of prickles just below each leaf, whereas 'Rose d'Amour' has mixed thorns and prickles indiscriminately disposed on strong shoots. The pairs of prickles and the shape of the leaves indicate possible affinity with R. carolina, another American species.

This note has been prompted by a letter from Gordon Coe, a rose-friend for many years; in Elgin, Morayshire, with information about an old plant of 'Rose d'Amour' from Miss Effie Baillie of Lochloy, Nairn, who is now, at the time of writing, in her 97th year. Her great-great-grandmother was Anne Edwyn of Baggrave Hall, Leicestershire, who married the Reverend Andrew Burnaby (1734-1812), best known for his book Observations on the State of the Colonies, published in 1775, just before the War of American Independence. By family tradition George Washington gave a bush of 'Rose d'Amour' to Mrs Burnaby. This bush has been growing in the garden at Lochloy since that time. In spite of their scarcity today these two roses are not likely to be lost, since they have so much charm of bud and flower, are quite hardy, fragrant and thrifty

Book  (1966)  Page(s) 210.  
 
As Rose d' Amour is considered now to have been a hybrid between these two fine American roses [Rosa virginiana and R. carolina], not the double form of R. virginiana as had previously been supposed, this was a happy mistake as far as we were concerned. This charming hybrid has given us endless pleasure in a corner of the rock garden beneath a tall purple birch, three other wild American roses - foliolosa, virginiana and carolina - suckering freely nearby. The shiny fresh green foliage of this double rose colours well in the autumn and is always attractive, as are the fully open medium-sized flowers of a delicious shade of rosy-pink; but it is the bud, with its long, reflexing, curled sepals which has made it famous. Count d'Orsay, a distinguished man of letters and a Director of Fine Arts during the Third Empire, was a great dandy-in fact, by the cut of his coats, he set the fashion for the men of his day. He generally wore a rose in his buttonhole, his favourite one being Rose d'Amour, which came to be known, also, as Count d'Orsay's Button-hole Rose. After the introduction of this charming rose into Europe, it quickly became popular. In Venice, it was called St Mark's Rose, as its flowers were said to open first on that saint's day. Edward Bunyard in Old Roses, A. T. Johnston in The Mill Garden, and Gertrude Jekyll in Roses For English Gardens all praise the beauty of the low-growing Rose d' Amour and speak of its rarity: while Sacheverell Sitwell, in Old Garden Roses, mentions being sent a plant of an Oleander Rose which he discovered afterwards to be the lovely fragrant Rose d'Amour, a real garden treasure.

Book  (1936)  Page(s) 149.  
 
'St. Mark's Rose'. Rose d'Amour These names, according to Miss Willmott, apply to the double form of what we have long known as Rosa Lucida, now to be called Virginiana. The flowers are a rich red pink, fragrant, 1 1/2 in. across, semi-double, remaining long in flower in contrast with the fugitive single form. The compact nature of this variety, reaching 3 to 4 ft., makes it an admirable small garden rose and it thrives in sun or shade, and on the driest of soils. This was introduced by Miller in 1768, and was known in France as the Rose d'amour, and in Venice as St. Mark's Rose, as it flowers there on the Patron Saint's Day, April 25th. It can be distinguished from the Rose de Mai (R. cinnamonea) by its shining leaves, hence the old name Lucida.

Book  (1921)  Page(s) 170.  
 
By Thomas N. Cook, Mass.:
There is a place where Rosa virginiana has been found with double flowers. This rose was known in France a long, long time ago, and is still grown there and in England. This plant is named by some "Rose d'Amour," which is a mistake. The Rose d'Amour described by Thory and painted by Redouté is Gallica and the double form of our American rose was also described and painted by the same rose-lovers.

Book  (1917)  Page(s) 11.  
 
[A] double-flowered form of Rosa virginiana, the Rose d'Amour, has been known since 1768....

Article (magazine)  (1914)  Page(s) 370.  
 
The double form of R. virginiana, the Rose d'Amour of old gardens, known in England since 1768, is one of the most charming of small Roses.

Book  (1902)  Page(s) 15.  
 
There is a strong growing garden variety [of Rosa lucida], much more free in habit than the type, but it does not make such neat bushes. The double form that has been long in English gardens, but has never become common, and whose merit is only now becoming recognised, is one of the loveliest of bush Roses. It has the pretty old name Rose d'Amour. How this Rose of American origin first came to be a plant of old English gardens is a question that I must leave to be answered by the botanist-antiquary; what chiefly concerns us is that it is one of the most delightful things in the garden.