June Birthstone and Flowers
Pearl, the birthstone for June, is a time-honored symbol of purity and great worth. Its very name is a metaphor for something extraordinary, precious, and highly prized. In addition to purity, pearls stand for honesty and calmness. They are also strongly associated with femininity.
The pearl is the only birthstone made by a living creature. Although in Ancient Greece pearls were said to be made from tears of joy shed by the beautiful goddess Aphrodite, they are in reality hard objects produced within the soft tissue of a shelled mollusk. When an irritant such as a parasite or a grain of stand gets into the shell, the mollusk covers it with smooth crystalline nacre. Layer upon layer of this liquid coating is deposited, ultimately forming a pearl. The rarest pearls occur naturally, but most pearls sold today are cultured or farmed from pearl oysters and freshwater mussels.
Biblical references to pearls include this famous New Testament parable
Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant man, seeking goodly pearls; Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all he had, and bought it.
(Matthew 13:45-46)
Some Christians informally refer to the entrance to Heaven as “the pearly gates.” The expression is taken from this verse:
And the twelve gates were twelve pearls: every several gate was of one pearl: and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass.
(Revelation 21:21)
Shakespeare used pearls as similes a number of times, including this allusion to the beautiful Helen of Greece:
She is a pearl Whose price hath launch'd above a thousand ships
(Troilus and Cressida, Act ii, sc. 2)
Heinrich Heine’s poem “Of Pearls and Stars” begins with the verse
The pearly treasures of the sea,
The lights that spatter heaven above,
More precious than these wonders are
My heart-of-hearts filled with your love.
The rose and the honeysuckle, both very fragrant, are the birth month flowers for June.
Roses have many meanings depending on the color. For example, a red rose signifies “I love you,” white stands for purity, pink can mean perfect happiness. According to The Old Farmer’s Almanac, “a single rose amplifies the meaning of the color (a single red rose means “I REALLY love you”).” These blooms of the woody perennial flowering plant of the genus Rosa, of the family Rosaceae, are some of the best loved and most popular flowers in the world.
The first flowers Neal sent me were gorgeous red roses, and the meaning was so great I carried a bouquet of red roses when we married. (My wedding colors were violet and royal blue, so I initially worried about breaking up my color scheme, but knowing how I felt about red roses, my mother encouraged me to go ahead and use them for my bridal bouquet. I did, with ribbons in the wedding colors.)
There are numerous literary references to roses, including the famous poem “A Red, Red Rose” by Robert Burns, which begins:
O my Luve is like a red, red rose
That’s newly sprung in June...
Roses are known for their beauty, fragrance, soft petals, and those sharp points on their stems. Contrary to popular belief, roses don’t have thorns, but “prickles.” Anne Brontë wrote “ He that dares not grasp the thorn should never crave the rose.” The line would not be the same with the correct botanical term, so perhaps a little poetic license is in order.
The honeysuckle stands for everlasting, devoted love. Native to the Northern Hemisphere (originating predominately in China), honeysuckles are arching shrubs or twining bines in the family Caprifoliaceae. Its tubular flowers contain a sweet edible nectar.
In the book Chevrefoil by Marie de France, the ill-fated lovers Tristan and Isolde are represented by honeysuckle and hazel. In the Robert Frost poem “To Earthward,” honeysuckle is a symbol of intense love and passion.
My 1908 E. Nash “Gem Birthday Series” postcard for June, depicting wild roses and pearls. This one was never used.
Antique postcards usually show the rose as the June birth month flower, although I did find one with honeysuckle and pearl. What surprised me was how often I found antique cards pairing the rose with other gems, including agate and tiger eye. As mentioned at the beginning of this series, birth stone gems were not standardized until 1912, and antique postcards bear this out.
Charmingly, my 1908 E. Nash postcard for June depicts roses in their natural form. Species roses, or wild roses, have five petals and multiple stamens. The red-pink roses appear below the signature gold star of this postcard series, with a pearl necklace encircling the words “Many Happy Returns of the Day.” Just above the pearls is the word “June” with this verse;
In the month of June sweet roses bloom,
a symbol of love divine.
Your birthday stone the priceless pearl
Health and long life define.
Thy stars bright rays on this you day,
Dissolves all sorrows in its way.
(This series is not free from typographical errors, and I’m sure “this you day” was meant to read “this your day.)
Unmarked antique postcard from my collection with the same conventions as the Nash birthday gem series.
I have another embossed antique postcard for June birthdays that is not marked Nash, but follows the same conventions as the Nash gem series, with a star, roses, a quarter moon-shaped pearl-studded gold pin, and the word “June,” shown diagonally across the card. The phrase “Many Happy Returns of the Day” is in the lower right, and the verse, in the upper left corner, reads:
These roses bring their message sweet
Of love enduring, love complete.
The Pearl with
radiance serene
Long life and happy
health doth mean.
Thy star looks down
on this birthday,
And drives
all sorrows
far away.
Happy birthday to all June babies! This month I will mark the birthday of my late, much-loved cousin Jeanne and help my wonderful, long-lived mother Jacqueline celebrate another year of life.
