Primroses Sakiwake sakurasoh Kagyoh sakurasoh Vol. 46 FALL, 1988 No. 4 PRIMROSES The drawings on front and back Quarterly of the are from a Japanese gardening b> American Primrose Society lished in 1733, "Chikinshoh Furoku" /,. Summer is Dying Fall 1988 Mr. Ihei Itoh, and accompanied the /e,,j ture article on Sakurasoh by Kazuo Har,-\n this issue Volume 46, Number 4 by Laura Louise Foster Published October 1, 1988 These are the last sweet days of summer and the leaves Entered 2nd Class, Bryn Mawr, Pa. spin float drift slip through the sunspun air smelling of mushrooms and woodsmoke ripeapple leafmold spiced and laced with the sharp cold fragrance of asters and drying grass. Plunge your hands in the fire of color. Drink deep the smoky spicy Summer is Dying bluehaze of summer's breath by Laura Louise Foster .... 121 for she is dying in glory Join a Round Robin and there is a long grey time between. by Elizabeth van Sickle .... 122 Sakurasoh: Primula Sieboldi These are the last days. by Kazuo Hara 123 The air is blue with mist in the morning Moving Along and the hills are blue on the blue sky And in the evening by Dee Peck 131 Let's Talk Cameras the mountains are crimson and gold, the rivers streaks of scarlet. by Bruce Gould 132 The Genus Primula Touch the scarlet the crimson, by Josef Halda 135 Bask in the flame hot reds Transplanting Seedlings 149 and the yellow Candelabra Primula the bright bright yellow by Herb Dickson 153 while the birds Primula Suffretescens flock and swirl above the burning hills. by Gwen Baker 156 For summer has spread her funeral meats For the Love of the Primula and the black crows gather. by Glenn Barber 158 Garner the amber. The gold of the sunfold lap-warm about you against the long lententime for the crows have come to feast to pry surreptitious and strut their mourning. PRIMROSES (ISSN 0162-6671] is published quarterly by American Primrose, Auricula and Primula Society, 8518 - 28th Ave. E., These are the last Hold her close kiss Tacoma, WA 98445. Second-class postage the last days of summer her golden sunwarmed skin paid at Tacoma, WAand additional mailing and the birds stream away for she is leaving offices. and the last leaf falls and a long barren time will pass and the sky before the seed of spring POSTMASTER: Send address changes to thickens with wind bruised clouds. quickens and swells PRIMROSES, 6730 West Mercer Way, in the womb of the year. Mercer Island, Washington 98030, American Primrose Society Page 121 Sakurasoh: Join a Round Robin, exchange ideas and information, Primula Sieboldii become friends. by Kazuo Hara, Secretary Matsumoto Sakurasoh & Primula Club Matsumoto, Nagano, Japan HOW A ROUND ROBIN WORKS 1. You write a letter to me, Elizabeth van Sickle, 654 Marine Drive The Historical and Cultural Background Sequim, Washington, DC 98382, USA telling where you live, some- thing about your interests, other than primroses (play the violin, grow (Ed.'s Note: Because of its charm and garden plants which you see popular all roses, raise geese, 4H Leader, have two little children or four grown felicity of expression the editor has left over the world today were raised and children) type of growing conditions, soil, weather and mountains, this piece all but untouched. I know you bred in those days; for example, Sakura sea level. How long have you been growing primroses and what types will enjoy it that way as much as I did.) (cherry blossom), camellia, peony, do you grow and are you interested in other varieties? chrysanthemum, morning glory, In the gardening world of Japan- Hanashobu (Japanese Iris), lily, Kaede 2. What kind of a Robin would you enjoy being in? Sakurasoh (sieboldii) dominates over a (Japanese maple tree), Fuji (Japanese wis- 3. Rules of the Robin: lot of other cultivated primulas as one of teria), Satsuki (Japanese azalea), etc. Be- The Robin travels via the mail, arrives and you read, enjoy, copy, the traditional garden plants and is re- sides, there are still lots of those which glean information, if seeds are enclosed take a few and within ten garded as incomparable just like the case have not been introduced to the world (10) days send the packet on with your new letter enclosed (remove i |bf Auricula in Great Britain, yet and not known well. Sakurasoh is one your "old" letter) Your letter should be kept to three (3) or under It was back in Edo Era lasting from the of them. (1) pages and pictures two, if you send these being sure they are beginning of 17th century to the mid 19th The Japanese had described various labeled. The Robin always goes FIRST CLASS . postage being century when the gardening culture flowers in the form of poems ever since what it is ... do not put catalogs or other material in the Robin . flourished most and culminated in the ancient times. However we cannot find list addresses and information ... if other members wish the long history of japan except for today. any description of Sakurasoh in the an- material they may send for their copy. During the long period of time which had cient poetry. It was the end of 16th cen- lasted for nearly 300 years, japan had en- tury that Sakurasoh had first appeared in 4. When you mail the packet on you send me a post-card with the joyed stable days under the strong feudal a literature on flower arrangement. Also, date on it of when you mailed it ... and IF you must keep it over system governed by the Tokugawas (the Sakurasoh is said to have been first fea- ten let me know. (You don't have to keep it ten days) Tokugawa shogunate) without involved tured in a gardening book entitled in any warfares. It closed the door com- "Kadan Kohmoku" (published in 1681). 5. This sheet and your members list always stay with the Robin. pletely to the world except for China, In a publication on gardening called 6. Type if possible, if not write or print clearly. Don't use pencil as Korea and Holland. Isolated from the "Kadan Chikinshoh" (written by Ihei Itoh it fades as the packet goes through the mail. world, people enjoyed peaceful days and in 1695) a brief description about the col- lives, and various arts and industries, cul- our of corollas was included and it ture and science had developed and explained only about the purple flower evolved during the time of peace. form and the white flower form of P. Allowing for Holidays and slow mail an eightmember Robin returns Since the successive 'shoguns' of the sakurasoh. Thereafter, the reference to about every three months ... a good Robin usually makes it around Tokugawas had cherished flowers out of P. sakurasoh became more frequent and three times per year. I find more than ten members is "over-load" the common, the habit of plant culture the part of description on its cultuvars in takes too long and interest is lost. Better to start another Robin than prevailed among 'daimyos' (feudal lords) books increased every time new publica- have one too large. first and spread to scholars, then to tions on gardening came out to the pub- uddhist monks and to wealthy mer- lic. In 1733 a gardening book entitled ) chants, down to the citizens. Quite a few "Chikinshoh Furoku" was published Page 123 Page 122 1988 Fall Quarterly American Primrose Society the plants all over Japan again. And now featuring descriptions and illustrations of into an object of speculation. It was % posed to different culture introduced from the Western countries, and so they small clubs of Sakurasoh lovers and chap- 9 varieties of Sakurasoh together with P. equally true in the case of "Hanashobu" r seemed to have forgotten Sakurasoh for ters of the society have been established modesta and P. kisoana. (Japanese Iris) and "Hanabasu" (Japanese that period.(5i But Sakurasoh was never one after another in every place of Japan The habitat of P. sieboldii ranged lotus flower). On the contrary, "Rens" of totally neglected by all. Soon after Japan's since then. widely all over Japan. Edo (now Tokyo) Sakurasoh became extremely closed to opening its door to the world, the aristo- Thinking about the history of Auricula was merely a newly developed city when the public in order to avoid scattering crat classes began to devote themselves on this occasion, I see it very interesting leyasu Tokugawa (1542-1616), the first and mixing-up of named varieties and the to culture and breeding of Sakurasoh. that, while Sakurasoh and Auricula be- shogun, founded the shogunate there. rules in each "Ren" became rigid too. On The characteristic of those varieties, if we long to the different species and they To the north, there was a large meadow the other hand, it was rather democratic point out here, which have been raised made quite remote and different process which was a fertile flood plain of Ara River inside the group.w By the time when since then, is that most of them have the of development from each other in their running in the middle of Edo, where P. those "Rens" flourished here and there, tendency toward being gigantic corollas. horticultural history at both ends of the sakurasoh grew gregariously all over. highly improved varieties of Sakurasoh Exclusivism of the Sakurasoh groups, Old World, the former in the east and Every spring people of Edo city came and were raised one after another. Almost a the latter in the west, on a quite contras- enjoyed hiking and seeing flowers of half of the varieties we grow today have however, remained unchanged even tive standard of beauty one another, they Sakurasoh there.