Damask rose

The queen of flowers and source of perfume

The rose is the queen of flowers! The Damask rose is the most fragrant: rose oil is made from its petals. 1 kg of oil needs 4 tonnes of petals — which is why it costs more than gold! In Bulgaria's 'Valley of Roses' there is a rose festival every May. In Uzbekistan roses grow in every garden, and Tashkent has a 'Flower Festival'. Thorns protect the rose from animals.

The Damask rose (Rosa × damascena) is a hybrid of R. gallica and R. moschata (or R. fedtschenkoana — a Central Asian species!) bred in the Middle East thousands of years ago and brought to Europe via Damascus. The backbone of perfumery: Bulgaria (Kazanlak Valley) and Turkey (Isparta) produce 80% of the world's rose oil; flowers are picked at dawn and steam-distilled with a 0.03% yield — 1 kg of oil from 4 tonnes of petals, worth over $10,000. Rose water has been used in Eastern cooking and medicine since antiquity (Ibn Sina refined its distillation). The rose symbolises Persian poetry ('the rose and the nightingale') and Islamic art. In Uzbekistan roses are grown for ornament and rose water; the Tashkent Botanical Garden has over 1,000 varieties.

Fun facts

• 1 kg of rose oil needs 4 tonnes of petals — it costs more than gold.
• Ibn Sina improved the distillation of rose water.
• One 'parent' of the Damask rose may be a wild rose from Central Asia.