supplement on this earlier article
I will explore here, at least superficially, the connection between botany and French chauvinism, what we, the French, name derogatively « esprit de clocher ». It has to do with the color blue, as exemplified by Valery Giscard d’Estaing, when president of
France, slightly changing in 1972 the blue in the national flag; or as various national French sports teams being known as Les Bleus, from the color of their uniforms.
France has a long history. Its tricolor flag dates back to 1794, i.e., the time of the French Revolution. At that time, white stood for the monarchy while blue and red were emblematic of the city of Paris. The blue color became quite officially associated to blue
cornflowers because, during World War I, those sturdy little plants were more or less the only ones to populate and be seen in muddy trenches and fields. The French officialdom accordingly chose them subsequently as iconic symbols of the country.
The blue pigment is named protocyanin. It is an astounding composite, putting together an organic molecule, succinylcyanin, another from the family of flavones, malonylflavone, and the metallic ions ferric Fe3+ and magnesium Mg2+ The proportions are 6, 6, 1 and 1.
In other words, this is a supramolecular assembly, the metallic ions serve as the rivets holding it together. Scientifically, this is a superb architecture, to which the centaurea flowers owe their color.
Not only are they beautiful, they are also healthy and helpful, they relieve, for instance, when absorbed from teas a number of digestive issues.
As regards their beauty, I leave the final words to a fellow-writer, a lady from Québec, named Perrine Leblanc, a prose-writer of the first rank:
“The color of centaury is one of the shades of blue that I find most soothing. In French, it would be described as a blue-grey, verging on grey, but to my eye it looks like a dirty, mottled, impure blue, verging on another shade that I love, parme, a colour of wool
that I use extensively in my knitting. “ (my translation from the much more enticing French original, in the book Petite nature, Marchand de feuilles, Montréal, 2025, p. 150.)