Title page. The language of flowers, with illustrative poetry. (1841). Contributed in BHL from Chicago Botanic Garden, Lenhardt Library. Digitization sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH).

On 30 April 2021, join the Chicago Botanic Garden’s Lenhardt Library and the Caxton Club for a free, virtual symposium celebrating the Language of Flowers—a popular literary trend in the 19th century that presented the world of botany through dictionaries of flowers and associated meanings, floral poetry and prose, offering a sentimental view of natural history.

Language of Flowers Virtual Symposium
When? Friday, 30 April 2021, 10am-2pm CT
Where? Online (via Zoom webinar)

Learn more and register for the event.

The Chicago Botanic Garden’s Lenhardt Library, a BHL Affiliate, presents this symposium in collaboration with the Caxton Club as the capstone event for a grant awarded by the National Endowment for the Humanities to conserve and digitize language of flower genre editions. Over the three-year grant period, 62 rare and unique language of flowers volumes published in the 19th century are being conserved and digitized by expert staff at the Northeast Document Conservation Center, with the volumes being made available in the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL).

You can explore volumes digitized as part of this grant as well as other titles from the genre in the Language of Flowers collection in BHL.