What is saffron?

By Chelsie Vandaveer

January 4, 2002

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"Spikenard and saffron; calamus and cinnamon, with all trees of frankincense, myrrh and aloe..." so Solomon wrote of the love of his life (Song of Solomon 4:14). Saffron is the single rarest spice. It has been cultivated in the Middle East for at least 35 centuries. Saffron was used to flavor foods, to dye the clothing of royalty,
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Saffron Crocus Crocus sativus
One of the few fall blooming crocus. Treasured for the golden stigma which are used to color and flavor food and also used as a dye for fabric. Saffron comes from safar in Arabic meaning yellow.

Each cup-shaped bloom is a rich lavender with dark purple veining. A special treat in borders, rock gardens or naturalized setting. Multiplies rapidly! Grow 4-5" tall. 8-9 cm bulbs. Zone 5 to 8 Click here - Save $20 on $50 order

and as an aphrodisiac.

In Persia and Greece, the yellow dye (saffron yellow) was considered the perfection of beauty and the "aroma, a perfect ambrosia". In Rome, Nero had saffron spread on the floor with sawdust to cushion the feet of his banquet guests. Saffron in sweet wine was the Roman morning-after-a-banquet hangover cure. Sometime during the centuries of use, saffron was lost to the wild places and is now known only in cultivation.

Saffron comes from the autumn blooming Crocus sativus. Although the crocus is a triploid (three sets of chromosomes) and sterile, it produces fragrant lavender to purple-veined blooms. Each flower has three long red stigmata (plural of stigma). The blood-red stigmata are called saffron threads (the spice).

The Arabs called it, Zahafaran from which we derived the name saffron. The plant has been under continuous cultivation in Spain since the Moorish conquest in 711 AD. The ancient Hebrews called it, Karkom; the ancient Greeks, Krokos, but it is the Roman (Latin) that Linnaeus kept for the botanical name, Crocus. Sativus means cultivated, possibly a reference that it no longer grows wild.

The Swedish Museum of Natural History has Linnaeus' Herbarium on-line. To view a photograph of the herbarium specimen of Crocus sativus, click on the link:

http://linnaeus.nrm.se/botany/fbo/c/crocu/crocsat1.html.en

Gernot Katzer's Spice Pages has photographs and articles about Crocus sativus. To view the photograph and read the article, click on the link:

http://www.uni-graz.at/~katzer/engl/Croc_sat.html

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