A small, low-growing woodland perennial whose intensely fragrant purple flowers gave their colour, their name, and their perfume to multiple languages.
Where it grows
The sweet violet grows in shaded grass banks, hedge bottoms, and old churchyards across Europe, the Mediterranean, and into central Asia. It spreads slowly by stolons and self-seeds quietly; once established it forms tight low patches that persist for decades in the same corner of a garden.
How to recognise it
A low rosette of heart-shaped dark green leaves spreads close to the ground. Single nodding flowers on slender stems carry five petals arranged with two upper, two lateral, and one lower scoop-shaped petal with a small spur behind it. The scent is the famous “violet” perfume — sweet, powdery, with a slightly green note.
Garden & cultural uses
Violet flowers have been candied in syrup as crystallised violets in Toulouse and Lyon since the eighteenth century. Sirop de violette colours and flavours French drinks. The flower’s natural alpha- and beta-ionones are reproduced synthetically, since real violet absolute is rare and expensive; ionone famously fatigues the olfactory receptors so the scent seems to disappear and reappear.
In symbolism
In ancient Athens the violet was the city emblem, “Violet-crowned Athens”; in Christian symbolism it represented modesty and the humble virtues of Mary.
Find more flowers by letter
Violet starts with V and ends with T. Browse other flowers along the same letter.
Flowers that contain a letter from "Violet":