Short Stuff: Victorian Flower Language | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

What this episode is about

The main topic delves into the Victorian practice of florography, the art of communicating unspoken messages through the arrangement and symbolism of flowers, particularly during a time when societal norms often prohibited open expression of feelings. The discussion highlights the complexities of this floral language, including the specific meanings ascribed to various flowers and their arrangements, showcasing its significance in both Victorian and Regency eras.

Key takeaways

• Victorian florography: where wilted roses speak louder than words in a society obsessed with decorum.
• From the Ottoman Empire to the UK: one aristocrat's letters turned blooms into an elaborate communication system.
• Floriography's complexity resembles a relationship quiz—much can be conveyed by how you tie a ribbon.
• Today, modern romance misses the subtlety of flower codes; we’ve traded depth for emojis and texts.
• Jane Austen relied on floriography, but modern readers might need a decoder to catch the romantic cues.

Who speaks in this episode?

• Josh Clark (Host) · 7 min speaking
• Chuck Bryant (Host) · 7 min speaking

What is discussed, and when

1. 0:00 – 3:00: Josh Malcolm Clark, Ottoman Empire, florography, Charles W. Chuck Bryant
2. 3:00 – 6:00: Jane Austen, Constantinople, Pride and Prejudice, Regency
3. 6:00 – 9:00: tussy mussy, Charles W. Chuck Bryant, nose gay, Victorian
4. 9:00 – 12:00: florography, hydrangea, orange lily, tanzy
5. 12:00 – 14:28: nose gay, carnation, pansy

Notable quotes from "Short Stuff: Victorian Flower Language | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW"

• We're talking about is florography, and there were a lot of florography books because it turns out florography was a huge deal in the Victorian and Regency areas. I guess…

  about florography · at 0:43

• About. But first, I want to shout out some great sources that helped with this. Farmers Almanac, the Iowa State University Extension, Pedal Republic, it's a great name. author…

  about Farmers Almanac · at 1:50

• To Europe via one single person, a British aristocrat who is married to the British ambassador to Turkey. Her name was Lady Mary Wartley. And she would send back letters to…

  about Lady Mary Wortley Montagu · at 2:50

• Seen Emily yet today because she got out of the house early but I wanted to ask her cuz she's you know like a lot of Gen X women are obsessed with Jane Austin stuff and Sense and Sensibility and all those series and movies and books.

  about Jane Austen · at 4:24

• Yes. Yeah, they would do that. I found a quote from Pride and Prejudice from Jane Austin.

  about Pride and Prejudice · at 5:18

• Even had its own meaning. Charity or maternal love. throw a violet in there maybe for modesty. If you put all those together in a little tussy mussy and gave it to somebody…

  about tussy mussy · at 7:12

• You know there's an established thing kind of happening here for your own context. So if you get a hydrangeanger it can be thanking the receiver for understanding or that you think they're frigid and heartless right?

  about hydrangea · at 9:28

• Talking about jealousy with marolds. You could be expressing distrust with lavender. Orange lily straight up said, I hate you. you could say, I feel deceived with snapd…

  about orange lily · at 11:40

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

• Josh Malcolm Clark — Person · Host · 3 mentions · first at 0:04
  Josh Clark co-hosts the episode, introduces the topic, cites sources, and explains the mechanics of flower-code messaging.
  Hey and welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh and there's Chuck and that's all that needs mentioning today because it's just us. So this is short stuff.
• Charles W. Chuck Bryant — Person · Co-host · 2 mentions · first at 0:05
  Charles "Chuck" Bryant co-hosts, banters with Josh Clark, and helps illustrate florography through examples (nosegay, ribbon placement, acceptance gestures).
  Well, may I ask where on your chest are you wearing it?
• Lady Mary Wortley Montagu — Person · Historical transmitter of idea · 1 mention · first at 2:57
  Described as the British aristocrat whose letters from Constantinople helped spread the Ottoman flower-code tradition into Europe.
• Jane Austen — Person · Referenced author · 2 mentions · first at 4:50
  Jane Austen is cited as an author whose works used florography to develop characters, with Pride and Prejudice referenced as an example.
• Sarah (Substack author) — Person · Referenced source · 1 mention · first at 1:58
  Cited by the hosts as one of the sources that helped them research florography for the episode.
  This. Farmers Almanac, the Iowa State University Extension, Pedal Republic, it's a great name. author Sarah on Substack, Clive Rose, Georgina Garden Center, thirsty, just the D, Flower Meaning, and historical holly all.
• Clive Rose — Person · Referenced source · 1 mention · first at 2:01
  Named among the research sources used for the episode’s florography information.
  State University Extension, Pedal Republic, it's a great name. author Sarah on Substack, Clive Rose, Georgina Garden Center, thirsty, just the D, Flower Meaning, and historical holly all helped with this. So, thanks to all of.
• Emily (Josh Clark's wife) — Person · Anecdotal reference · 1 mention · first at 4:21
  Mentioned as someone Josh Clark wanted to ask about whether florography appears in Jane Austen adaptations, illustrating modern unfamiliarity with the code.
  Wasn't like the kind of thing that you could really talk about openly in that class and this is one thing I haven't seen Emily yet today because she got out of the house early…

Books & papers

• Pride and Prejudice — Book · Referenced literary example · 1 mention · first at 5:19
  Used as a humorous example of how florography could appear in literature, with a quoted/imagined passage about a red rose signaling love.

Companies & orgs

• Farmers Almanac — Company · Referenced source · 1 mention · first at 1:54
  Listed as one of the sources the hosts used to research florography and flower meanings.
• Iowa State University Extension — Company · Referenced source · 1 mention · first at 1:54
  Cited as a research source supporting the episode’s discussion of flowers and meanings.
  About. But first, I want to shout out some great sources that helped with this. Farmers Almanac, the Iowa State University Extension, Pedal Republic, it's a great name. author…
• Pedal Republic — Company · Referenced source · 1 mention · first at 1:56
  Named among sources used for the episode; likely referenced for florography/flower-delivery or bouquet context.
  Some great sources that helped with this. Farmers Almanac, the Iowa State University Extension, Pedal Republic, it's a great name. author Sarah on Substack, Clive Rose, Georgina Garden Center, thirsty, just the D,.
• Georgina Garden Center — Company · Referenced source · 1 mention · first at 2:05
  Listed as one of the sources that contributed information for the episode’s florography discussion.
  Republic, it's a great name. author Sarah on Substack, Clive Rose, Georgina Garden Center, thirsty, just the D, Flower Meaning, and historical holly all helped with this. So, thanks to all of you.
• Flower Meaning — Company · Referenced source · 1 mention · first at 2:09
  Cited as a source used to compile flower meanings discussed in the episode.
  Georgina Garden Center, thirsty, just the D, Flower Meaning, and historical holly all helped with this. So, thanks to all of you.
• historical holly — Company · Referenced source · 1 mention · first at 2:09
  Named as a research source supporting the episode’s historical discussion of flower symbolism.
  Georgina Garden Center, thirsty, just the D, Flower Meaning, and historical holly all helped with this. So, thanks to all of you.

Concepts & topics

• florography — Concept · Core topic · 2 mentions · first at 0:42
  The episode explains florography as a coded language of flowers used to send unspoken messages, especially in Victorian/Regency high society.
• nose gay — Concept · Key object/example · 3 mentions · first at 0:13
  The nosegay is used as a running example to demonstrate how bouquet orientation, ribbon placement, and where it’s worn can change meaning.
  That's right. and by the way, I wanted to thank you for sending over that beautiful nose gay of wilted white roses delivered upside down with a ribbon to the left.
• tussy mussy — Concept · Key object/example · 3 mentions · first at 6:39
  A tussy mussy is explained as a small bouquet worn like a boutonniere/corsage, used to combine flowers and herbs into complex coded messages.
• Victorian — Concept · Historical context · 2 mentions · first at 0:47
  The Victorian era is presented as a peak period for florography and the popularity of nosegays/tussy-mussies as coded social communication.
  And floriography in the Victorian age started to get popular at the same time that tussy mussies and nose gays were popular, too. And they're really kind of small, short, tightly bound bouquets.
• carnation — Concept · Example symbol in florography · 2 mentions · first at 7:48
  Carnations are used to show how florography encoded responses: solid color = yes, yellow = no, striped = gentle rejection.
  Many messages could be sent. If you wanted to send a message of rejection or disappointment, it could be a yellow carnation or a yellow rose. but if you send a yellow lily…
• Regency — Concept · Historical context · 2 mentions · first at 0:53
  Presented alongside the Victorian era as a period when florography was popular and socially useful for indirect communication.
  We're talking about is florography, and there were a lot of florography books because it turns out florography was a huge deal in the Victorian and Regency areas. I guess…
• hydrangea — Concept · Example symbol in florography · 1 mention · first at 9:31
  Hydrangea is used to show ambiguity in flower meanings: it can mean gratitude for understanding or imply someone is frigid/heartless.
• rosemary — Concept · Example symbol in florography · 1 mention · first at 7:06
  Used to show that herbs also carried meanings; rosemary is stated to mean remembrance.
  So like rosemary was for remembrance and mint was for clarity. moss even had its own meaning. Charity or maternal love. throw a violet in there maybe for modesty. If you put all.
• violet — Concept · Example symbol in florography · 1 mention · first at 7:14
  Given as an example of a flower meaning 'modesty' when included in a tussy-mussy message.
  And mint was for clarity. moss even had its own meaning. Charity or maternal love. throw a violet in there maybe for modesty. If you put all those together in a little tussy…
• orange lily — Concept · Example symbol in florography · 1 mention · first at 11:44
  Given as a blunt negative meaning example: orange lily 'straight up said, "I hate you."'
• tanzy — Concept · Example symbol in florography · 1 mention · first at 11:51
  Introduced as an unfamiliar flower whose meaning could be to 'declare war,' underscoring the breadth of the flower-code system.
  Yeah. I just I didn't know that flower existed, but by goodness it does.
• mint — Concept · Example symbol in florography · 1 mention · first at 7:09
  Presented as an herb with a coded meaning—mint for clarity—within a tussy-mussy message.
  So like rosemary was for remembrance and mint was for clarity. moss even had its own meaning. Charity or maternal love. throw a violet in there maybe for modesty. If you put all those together in a little tussy mussy.
• lavender — Concept · Example symbol in florography · 1 mention · first at 11:42
  Cited as a flower used to express distrust, showing that florography could convey negative messages.
  Right? There were like you could be talking about jealousy with marolds. You could be expressing distrust with lavender. Orange lily straight up said, I hate you. you could…
• snapdragon — Concept · Example symbol in florography · 1 mention · first at 11:46
  Used as an example of a coded emotional message: snapdragons could mean 'I feel deceived.'
  Could be expressing distrust with lavender. Orange lily straight up said, I hate you. you could say, I feel deceived with snapd dragons. You could declare war with a flower…
• moss — Concept · Example symbol in florography · 1 mention
  Used to illustrate that even non-flowers could have meanings; moss is said to mean charity or maternal love.
  So like rosemary was for remembrance and mint was for clarity. moss even had its own meaning. Charity or maternal love. throw a violet in there maybe for modesty. If you put all those together in a little tussy mussy.
• Gen X — Concept · Cultural reference · 1 mention · first at 4:27
  Used in an aside about interest in Jane Austen among Gen X women, framing modern fandom vs. lost historical context of florography.
  Seen Emily yet today because she got out of the house early but I wanted to ask her cuz she's you know like a lot of Gen X women are obsessed with Jane Austin stuff and Sense and Sensibility and all those series and movies and books.
• pansy — Concept · Mentioned flower (clarification aside) · 1 mention · first at 12:02
  Appears as a near-homophone in a joke about 'tanzy' possibly being a misprint for 'pansy', illustrating unfamiliarity with some flower names.
  Okay. I thought that might have been a misprint pansy, but I literally looked at my computer keyboard and was Nah, I bet it's that T and the P are pretty far apart.

Places & events

• Ottoman Empire — Place · Origin context · 2 mentions · first at 2:21
  Identified as the early origin (1600s) of a flower-based coded communication tradition (Selam) that later spread to Europe.
  Nothing new or was nothing new back then. coded messages through flowers goes back to the 1600s at least in the Ottoman Empire when they had a tradition called Selum or Summ L…
• Constantinople — Place · Geographic setting · 2 mentions · first at 2:33
  Named as the place where the harem-based Selam tradition is described and where Lady Mary Wortley Montagu lived while observing it.
  Called Selum or Summ L which was a game where between the members of the herum of Constantinople where they would send flowers attached with like rhymes and meanings and stuff like that to communicate with one another.

Full transcript with timestamps

0:04 Hey and welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh and there's Chuck and that's all that needs mentioning today because it's just us. So this is short stuff.

0:11 That's right. Uh and by the way, I wanted to thank you for sending over that beautiful uh nose gay of wilted white roses delivered upside down with a ribbon to the left.

0:23 Well, may I ask where on your chest are you wearing it? Near my bodice. in the center or

0:30 right in the center, maybe. Oh, well, I guess we're good friends then. I can live with that. Although, I'm not sure what I was saying with the whole thing. It's kind of

0:39 Yeah, I'd have to get out a code uh decoder book or whatever. Well, they had those, Chuck. Um, what we're talking about is florography, and there were a lot of florography books because it turns out florography was a huge deal in the Victorian and uh Regency areas. um I guess between couple of decades on either side of the 19th and 20th century divide, the DMZ of those centuries as it were. Um this was it was really popular to send unspoken messages using flowers.

1:10 That's right. Uh unspoken because at the time in the UK the and parts of the US obviously in Europe in certain you know high societies mainly uh you could not speak these things aloud. A lot of times it was uh unoured. So you had to have a coded way of talking to each other. And if you're thinking like, oh yeah, you send flowers to someone and that means something.

1:32 Yeah. It goes deep. Uh I mean it is literally a a code. And that's what I was kind of referring to with the upside down and the wilted and the where the ribbon's tied. Like all that stuff means something.

1:43 It does. Yeah, it is quite deep. And you can send quite complex messages and we'll kind of show what we're talking about. But first, I want to shout out some great sources that helped with this. Um, Farmers Almanac, the Iowa State University Extension, Pedal Republic, it's a great name. Uh, author Sarah on Substack, Clive Clive Rose,

2:05 Georgina Garden Center, thirsty, just the D, Flower Meaning, and historical holly all helped with this. So, thanks to all of you.

2:13 Yeah, that's wonderful. So, this is nothing new uh or was nothing new back then. Um, coded messages through flowers goes back to the 1600s at least in the Ottoman Empire when they had a tradition called Selum uh or Summ L which was a game where between uh the the members of the herum of Constantinople where they would send uh flowers attached with like rhymes and meanings and stuff like that to communicate with one another.

2:42 Yeah. Which made sense because a lot of them couldn't read or write so flowers did the talking for them. And this actually spread from the Ottoman Empire to uh Europe via one single person, a British aristocrat who is married to the the British ambassador to Turkey. Her name was Lady Mary Wartley. And she would send back letters to friends and family describing all of the new and exotic customs of this land that she had moved to. She moved to Constantinople. And among them was a description of um Salam or Salom. Salom. Which how did you say it? I said sell them or seal them.

3:18 I'm not sure if it's a long or shorty. Well, the flower code that the Haram workers had come up with. She wrote a letter about that and somebody uh got it and said, "This is great. I want to tell everybody in the UK about it."

3:30 That's right. Uh and by the way, I mentioned a couple of puns in the Operation Paul Bunan episode. Which one were you thinking because you said you remembered one

3:42 uh that the code stems back. Yeah, that was one. That's the only one I can think of.

3:48 Well, no. Here's the other one. Botney was a growing field. How did I miss that? My fun sensor is covered with dirt.

3:58 Well, no, that's good. You You want to pack some mud on that thing? I know, but um I don't like walking past stuff. I like to to take part, you know, be involved in the mix.

4:08 So, botney was a growing field. uh and floriography was uh like I said among certain classes you know mainly upper class women uh because you know it wasn't like the kind of thing that you could really talk about openly in that class and this is one thing uh I haven't seen Emily yet today because she got out of the house early but I wanted to ask her cuz she's you know like a lot of Gen X women are obsessed with Jane Austin stuff and Sense and Sensibility and all those

4:35 um series and movies and books and I wondered if she knew about this or if they in those because I've never watched any of them. If they were kind of pointed stuff out like, oh, he sent the flowers this way and that means this.

4:48 But that's I mean that's the Bronny sisters and Jane Austin used a lot of floriography to help kind of develop their characters which I guess

4:55 so I guess they did. Yeah, they they definitely did. And the readers at the time probably would have picked up on this, but fllorography is it's become so arcane and obscure that modern readers would not pick up on it. But if you learn about fllorography and you start reading Jane Austin, apparently it'll show up. Um

5:11 Oh, well no, that's what I was wondering if in the books and they said like, "Oh, well, he sent an upside down thing, which means blah blah blah."

5:18 Yes. Yeah, they would they would do that. I found a quote um from Pride and Prejudice from Jane Austin.

5:24 Oh, can you read it in character? Uh well, it's the narrator um so sure. I guess I can because the narrator sounds exactly like me.

5:32 Yeah. But uh Elizabeth Bennett is giving a flower to Mr. Darcy and the the narrator describes she gave a red rose to tell him that she loved him. Red rose red red red rose rose rose red rose red rose red. Rose red red. And then in the I think the first edition the word red is just repeated over and over for three pages before it just stops and a new chapter starts.

6:00 That's so hot. Yeah. Uh all right. All right, I need to go cool down. Should we take a break?

6:04 Yeah, I think so. Yeah. All right, we'll come back and tell you about a lot of this uh what these coded flowers mean right after this.

6:11 If you want to know, then you're in luck. Just know you should know. stuff you should know.

6:37 So, Chuck, you mentioned that I gave you a nose gay. Another great word for a nose gay is a tussy mussy.

6:43 Mhm. And floriography in the Victorian age started to get popular at the same time that tussy mussies and nose gays were popular, too. And they're really kind of small, short, tightly bound bouquets that you would kind of wear almost as like a bineir or a um corsage.

7:00 And they were made of flowers and herbs. So not just flowers, but herbs had their own meanings, too.

7:06 So um like rosemary was for remembrance and uh mint was for clarity. Uh moss even had its own meaning. Charity or maternal love. Uh throw a violet in there maybe for modesty. If you put all those together in a little tussy mussy and gave it to somebody, you would be saying something like, "I modestly ask you to clearly remember me with either charity or maternal love. Your pick."

7:30 Yeah. Which would be a very confusing message. It would be paging Dr. Freud on that one

7:36 for sure. Uh so the obviously, you know, the type of flower is going to matter. The color of the flower is going to matter.

7:43 Um many messages could be sent. If you wanted to send a message of rejection or disappointment, uh it could be a yellow carnation or a yellow rose. Uh but if you send a yellow lily, uh that means that you're just sort of over the moon and walking on air.

7:57 Yeah. Um obviously the red rose is going to mean I love you. A white rose is purity. Uh a yellow rose is loss of love and a crimson rose is for mourning with mou r.

8:09 Right? And I mean like that is just skimming the surface. Just the color of of different types of roses, right? Or different color roses, the state that the flowers in mattered a lot too. You may mention I think of a withered rose in the um tussy mussy I gave you.

8:25 Um if you gave somebody just a plain white rose, you could be saying like, I think you're heavenly. You're very pure and I like that. But if the white rose was withered, you were telling them that they made no impression on you whatsoever or that you think their beauty is fleeting. So remember that. And then if it was dried, you were saying, "I would rather die than to give into your advances because I care about my virtue."

8:49 And I'm sure you could be like, you know, if you gave somebody a withered rose, you'd be like, "Is this dried or withered? What are you trying to say here?" So I read on this how much was like in the beholders's eye.

9:01 Yeah. Yeah. I mean translation is important and you know we'll get to that here in a sec. But uh a thornless rose means you've fallen in love at first sight. Uh thornless crimson rose means you're mourning cuz remember crimson rose was morning but you're mourning an unrequited love at first sight,

9:17 right? Uh and also the context really matters. Like you know you you obviously kind of know what's going on between you. it's uh when you're getting these or you know you're you're seeking clarity but you you know there's an established thing kind of happening here for your own context. So if you get a hydrangeanger um it can uh be thanking the receiver for understanding

9:38 or that you think they're frigid and heartless right? So you really got to kind of have a a read on the general air of the relationship.

9:45 Yeah. Same with like patunias. You could be saying you soothe me or I resent you. So the context definitely mattered. The reason why like hydrangeas and pianies and and almost all of the flowers um had multiple meanings was not because they needed to pull double duty because we didn't have enough flowers and enough colors. Like if you put all those together you have a mind-boggling number of combinations. So that wasn't it. The reason they had multiple meanings was because there were many many different florography books and essentially a lot of them just assigned different meanings to different flowers.

10:19 Yeah. So, when you gave uh somebody flowers, especially if there wasn't a lot of context yet, you were just hoping that you guys were working from the same book.

10:29 Yeah. I mean, that's that's huge. I think there were 98 different guides just in the United States alone that were circulating from 1827 to 1923.

10:40 Not helpful at all. Uh and then, you know, I also mentioned that they were presented upside down.

10:45 That also matters. Uh, if they are upside down, that's the I it basically says it's opposite day, right? So, I guess you're trying to sort of maybe confuse if like if mom is looking on and sees these flowers, but it would seem like mom would know about opposite day, too. Uh, so I'm not really sure, you know, why they would do that. Maybe to throw somebody off the scent. Who knows? Um, how the ribbon was tied also matters. Tied to the left, it's uh the symbolism is applied to the giver, right? It's tied to the right

11:13 if it's uh in reference to the recipient. Yeah. Yeah. I know. This is how deep it gets. It could also express a lot of negative meanings. And I think that's what you were doing when you handed a bouquet upside down. You'd have to be pretty sharp to put a bunch of mean flowers in and then hand it to the person upside down to let them know you meant the opposite.

11:35 Yeah. But there a lot of trouble to go through, right? There were like you could be talking about jealousy with marolds. You could be expressing distrust with lavender. Orange lily straight up said, "I hate you." Uh, you could say, "I feel deceived with snapd dragons." You could declare war with a flower called a tanzy, which I hadn't heard of before, but it's like a bunched a bunch of like small yellow flowers together on like a single stalk.

12:02 Okay. I thought that might have been a misprint pansy, but I literally looked at my computer keyboard and was like, "Nah, I bet it's that T and the P are pretty far apart."

12:10 Yeah. I I just I didn't know that that flower existed, but by goodness it does.

12:14 Uh, also accepting um also mattered. So depending on which hand you accepted the flowers with sent a message,

12:20 which I guess would uh I mean if if you're handing them in person, you would know, but if not, you had to have it relayed back to you.

12:27 Yeah. Uh if you accepted with the right hand, it was a yes. Uh the left hand was a no. If you held the bouquet upside down after getting it, that's rejection. Um, if someone gave you wisteria, maybe like asking for a dance at a at a dance, you would hold it upside down with your left hand if you wanted to say no thank you,

12:48 right? Uh, yeah, you were really saying I'm I'm passing with that because you're that's a double no.

12:54 Although the the the person giving it could be like, is that a double negative? Like a yes.

12:58 Is it opposite day? Um, so you could also as the receiver send flowers in return, too. Like if somebody actually sent you flowers or a bouquet with a message and didn't physically hand it to you, you could reply with flowers yourselves, carnations came in handy for that. Um, if you sent a solid colored carnation, it meant yes. A yellow carnation was a big fat no. A stripe carnation was uh letting them down a little easier, but it was still a no. It said, "I'm sorry, but I can't be with you."

13:27 I wonder which flower meant like, you know, are are you down? Uh there was something like that out there. I guarantee it. I don't know which one.

13:37 Yeah. But there was definitely something. And then the last part, I asked you where you were wearing your nose gay and you said in the center of your bodice, which meant

13:46 I just want to be friends. But if you had worn it over your heart, Chuck, I would have known that you were saying I love you right back, buddy.

13:53 Hey, I do love you right back, buddy. Just, you know, not like that. I understand. I I took my shot.

13:59 Yeah. Uh, I guess then, Chuck, short stuff is out. I think so. Stuff You Should Know is a production of iHeart Radio. For more podcasts, iHeart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "Short Stuff: Victorian Flower Language | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW"?

Josh Clark (Host), Chuck Bryant (Host).

What is "Short Stuff: Victorian Flower Language | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW" about?

The main topic delves into the Victorian practice of florography, the art of communicating unspoken messages through the arrangement and symbolism of flowers, particularly during a time when societal norms often prohibited open expression of feelings. The discussion highlights the complexities of this floral language, including the specific meanings ascribed to various flowers and their…

What is mentioned in this Stuff You Should Know episode?

33 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including florography, Josh Malcolm Clark, Charles W. Chuck Bryant, nose gay, tussy mussy, Victorian. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "Short Stuff: Victorian Flower Language | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW"?

The episode runs 14 min; the transcript is about 2,762 words in 61 timestamped sections.

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