(1984)  Page(s) 24.  Includes photo(s).
 
"Aimable Rouge"
This small gallica rose was one of my first finds, and I was able to give it back ist true name when I found its double in 1979 in the rose section of a dealer specializing in old plants in Denmark. There it was called 'Aimable Rouge'. The pretty name suggests that it was given its name by Empress Josephine. At all events it is recorded that it grew in her garden in Malmaison.
Three years later in Kassel I celebrated a second, unexpected meeting with it. Rose lovers had unearthed in the Wilhelmshöhe Schloss Museum a forgotten treasure: 134 watercolour paintings of roses by the court painter Salomon Pinhas, which had been painted between 1806 and 1815 and had never been seen by the public. These coloured plates showed the roses of acollection that the Landgreve of Hesse began to build up from 1767 on. And lo and behold: 'Aimable Rouge' was also there, reproduced with accurate details down to the typical hollow, rounded foliage.
The blooms expand dark red and then become lighter and bluisher. The outer petals imprison the inner petals in a perfect circle, huddling them in delicate sirls, until a small firm button eye with a green point appears in the centre. Then the petals are reflexed in such an orderly manner that they lie on top of each other like minuscule roof tiles.
"Aimable Rouge" used to be found often in old hedges of cemeteries. She belongs to the sorts which probably are a victim of the wave of modernisation which currently has almost everywhere impacted the oldest parts of cemeteries. Despite her Beauty, she is no longer cultivated in gardens, perhaps due to the short habit. The stems are flexible and cannot carry the weight of the numerous double blooms. Has it been ever tried to graft it on a standard? She should be an ideal "weeping rose".

(1984)  Page(s) 25.  
 
Rosa gallica "Aimable Rouge", bloom 6 cm, 70-80 cm tall, once-blooming, origin unknown, 1814.

(1986)  Page(s) 64.  Includes photo(s).
 
"Dornenlose Kreiselrose" [Top-Rose without prickles]
For seven years I pondred this stranger, which I could not place anywhere after I found her rampant and with rotten buds in the unkempt outskirts of several cemeteries. Because of its extraordinarily thick ovary, I classified them in theclass of Francofurtana-Roses after a long consideration, which are also called Kreiselrosen [Top-Roses] (R. turbinata) in old directories.
However in autumn 1983 came a rose photo from Sweden which made me wonder. It showed Rosa suionum, an enigmatic old rose, supposedly onyl found in Scandinavia, about which people in the far North have been pondering already since decades. Today, I am forced to coordinate my broodings with those of the Swedish scientists, as it turned out that their and my mystery rose are indeed identical.
But that's not all: the Rosarium Sangerhausen in the GDR [German Democratic Republic] has again had the same rose since 1940, this time as the Alba variety 'Minette', which was commercialized by Vibert in France in 1819. Its documentation in Sangerhausen is however incomplete. It doesnt' state from where it came 45 years ago. In any case it doesnt' seem to be known in France, its supposed country of birth.
So at the moment are all experts dealing with this little devil of a rose somewhat unsettled about what they have. One thing is sure: they all have the same - a vagabond dressed in pearl-pink silk with a penchant for adventurous hikes, aliases and the caprice to let some of her beautiful buds rot, be it in Scandinavia, Sangerhausen or Dithmarschen.
Perhaps she also deceived Monsieur Vibert in 1819, because the closer I move her to my Alba-Roses, the clearer she tells me: an Alba I am not. Who knows, if it ever will be found out who she really is!

(1984)  Page(s) 90-91.  Includes photo(s).
 
"La Reine"
..."La Reine" wants to grow tall. Two meters is easy. Her wood is fresh green, hardy, her foliage healthy and glabrous, her massive, globular bloom with the neatly reflexed petal edges is carmine-pink and fragrant. ....Northern Germany was faithful to hybrid perpetuals for a long time due to their hardiness. Some direct descendants of "La Reine" are still found today in gardens north and south of the Elbe river.
"La Reine" has also been mixed-up in this century. Although all descriptions of the 19th century are agree on a bright carmine-pink with a shade of lilac, she is in commerce today as a very soft powder pink rose.
Hybrid perpetual "La Reine", bloom 10 cm, 200 cm high, repeat-blooming, breeder Laffay, 1843.

(1984)  Page(s) 30.  Includes photo(s).
 
"Nanette". Until recently I called this rose simply "Wuschelkopf" [tously-head], as I did not know her name. But now it has become evident that she is really that what I surmised for years: the Gallica-Rose "Nanette" from the nursery Dupont of 1802. ...It might sound curious, but this certainty came of all things from the other side of the globe, namely from New Zealand. "Nanette" appeared there with a typical portrait in a rose book.....When the trail of "Nanette" is followed back into the 19. century, all the alias in small print appear...alias "Invincible" alias "Incomparable"...

(1984)  Page(s) 56-57.  Includes photo(s).
 
Unbekannte rote Zentifolie (unknown red centifolia)
This not often found unknown....doubtlessly belongs into the class of centifolias. Foliage, wood and prickles of the shrub make it evident. The bloom not: Her perfect initial centifolia-form disintegrates soon into a loose, lush splendour and displays a vivid, almost streaked pink with silvery shaded reverse - all in all too fiery for the soft pink-scale of the older centifolias. On the other hand, she does not look like a more recent variety. ...brings forth a multitude of hips, a rarity in the very double centifolias.
Until the middle of the 19th century, there is a centifolia variety in Rose literature, which had no specific name (generally an indicator for a very old age for a rose), which was described only as "Rote Zentifolie" (red centifolia) or "Alte rote Zentifolie" (old red centifolia). But what is old in 1850? In the same books, I also always come back to the description of a centifolia, which is called "de Nancy". Especially the english breeder William Paul seems to have given in 1848 a well-matching description of my Unknown in his "de Nancy".
Still, I have my doubts. When I look at her, she appears sometimes strangely familiar. Where do I know her from? Maybe from paintings of Dutch painters of flowers in the 17th century?....
Rosa centifolia, Unknown red centifolia, bloom 9-10 cm, 150 cm high, once-blooming, origin and age unknown.

(1984)  Page(s) 86-87.  Includes photo(s).
 
Unbekannte Bourbonhybride (unknown hybrid bourbon)
Yes: leaning three meter high on a telegraph pole - this is how I found this Beauty in a village garden. The tall upright shrub was surrounded by suckers and decorated with numerous blooms glowing like lanterns among the slack, broad foliage. Blooms of unique beauty, full and rich, perfectly rounded, wide open with curiously folded petals in the middle; the colour a warm carmine-pink, at a closer look with fine, fishbone-like lines.
Naturally, the new inhabitants of the 1850s-60s house new nothing about this garden ornament. They had taken it over as is. Whether the house which was far outside the village had an older predecessor could not be clarified. Experts which saw the rose were enthusiastic, but shrugged. There was nothing else left but to be modest: Unknown Rose, probably belonging to the hybrid bourbon class. Her birth should be somewhere between 1840 and 1870.