Narcissus simplex ; narcissus pisanus maior ; narcissus narbonensis (1624)
水仙属
Narcissus simplex ; narcissus pisanus maior ; narcissus narbonensis (1624)
Ten ways of seeing
- measured cast amber
- upright 1.59 : 1
First Look
竖划三寸，当千仞之高；横墨数尺，体百里之迥。
—— 南朝宋·宗炳《画山水序》
A vertical stroke of three inches stands for a cliff of a thousand fathoms; a few feet of ink holds a hundred li.
The sheet is vertical: the eye climbs and settles in the upper half. Let the plant stand before you look for detail. Then step in close: watch where colour meets line, and whether the line ever breaks. Third, find the darkest small patch: the whole tonal order is measured from there.
Name and Thing
The binomial is Narcissus simplex: the first word is the genus it belongs among, the second the epithet that sets it apart. Here the epithet simplex means “single” — the name records the feature the namer noticed first. The Chinese name 水仙属 is a modern rendering of the Latin, not an old garden name.
Form and Colour
Measured on this plate: flower colour covers 7.8% of the sheet, foliage 2.5%, the cast amber with a second note of red. No other plate shares exactly this measure. A layered bulb, upright strap leaves, six white tepals and a small golden cup — the Chinese name is 'silver terrace with a golden cup'.No colour group is recorded. A single plant, laid out with nothing hidden.
Composition
The sheet is tall. No details are appended: a plate for looking, not for keying out. The plant covers only 11% of the sheet, centred near the centre; the emptiness is where the eye rests.
Line and Colour
Before 1700 most botanical figures came from woodcut: thick, hard lines in relief, colour brushed on afterwards. Craft leaves franker evidence than inscriptions. If you mean to copy it: take its skeleton, its margins and the order of its colours; the burin's hatching is the language of copper — suggest it with pencil density, do not imitate it stroke for stroke.
Poetic Resonance
疑水仙游泳，向别浦相逢。
—— 《临江仙引·画舸》
The poem gives the mood first and the picture supplies the form; set the line beside the plate and the corolla becomes its resting point.
Symbolism
In China it is the New Year's offering — clear, fragrant, a little otherworldly; in Europe, because of Narcissus, it means self-love and the gaze turned inward. In a flora it is a species first and a symbol second; the order is worth keeping.
Season and Place
Late winter into early spring: forced in water in the twelfth month, blooming at the New Year. Native to the Mediterranean, reaching China by sea in the late Tang. The year 1624 on the plate is that of publication, not of flowering — the gathering came a year or two earlier. The bud and the ripe fruit on one branch tell the season; the name in the title often tells the journey.
The Book and the Hand
“Collection of flowers and insects” carries only Daniel Rabel's name. A plate is collective work: drawer, engraver and colourist were different hands, and the unnamed ones decided how good it looks.
What to Take Away
If you keep one line, keep Guo Xi's: from afar its momentum, up close its texture. Two centuries on, the plant may still flower in some garden; the one on this sheet stopped in the season of 1624.
About this plate
Narcissus simplex ; narcissus pisanus maior ; narcissus narbonensis (1624) is plate 52, from Collection of flowers and insects, drawn by Daniel Rabel. This public-domain plate is reproduced at high resolution, free to view and download. Publication: Paris, 1624.
