In full flower

In a country where morning glories inch their way along anything that will bear their weight, where oleanders thrive in  stony ground and jasmine froths round every doorway it isn’t surprising that flor – flower should crop up so often in Spanish.

The prime of life, for instance, is la flor de la vida – the flower of life. The cream of society is renamed la flor y nata de la sociedad – the flower and cream of society and in this instance flor means the best of or the most superior part of something.   And, as in English, flor is also the bloom found on plums or grapes.

A flor de means level with and when everything gets on top of them, the Spanish complain tengo los nervios a flor de piel – my nerves are on the surface, an uncomfortably graphic way to describe that unrestful state of mind and body.  A flor de tierra makes a subtle shift to mean just below the ground, however.

Florecer means to flower while floreciente – blooming can also refer, as it does in English, to flourishing looks or booming business which is logical enough, since anyone doing well financially generally manages to look gorgeous and glossy anyway.



Azahar looks as good as it smells



Florecer also translates to blossom, for which there is neither a specific verb or noun, so almond and apple blossom are flor de almendro and flor de manzano although orange blossom has its own delicious translation of azahar.  

As well as being the past participle of florecer, when used as an adjective florecido corresponds to gone to seed horticulturally rather than metaphorically. Pan florecido is bad news, too, and means mouldy bread.

Florido can mean both flowering, flowery or florid but the only way to convey florid’s red-faced English description is rojizo, which rather  fails to get across the necessary hint of bluster or sweatiness.

Florear means to adorn or decorate with flowers so floreado means flowery without necessarily implying affected or pretentious (although it often does).

Un florete is a fencer’s foil but una floritura is an unnecessary embellishment to a painting, piece of writing or music and una florera is a flower-girl of both the strewing and selling variety. 

Un florero is a vase, not forgetting a slightly scornful description for a trophy wife or a woman whose value is  strictly decorative.

A bunch of flowers is un ramo de flores and at this point the linguistically imaginative might be forgiven for assuming – wrongly - that una ramera is yet another flower girl. Instead, the term is one that has been in use since the XV century when a working girl advertised her trade by fixing a bouquet to her balcony or at her door, with the pretence that she sold flowers, not herself.

The strategy was not entirely successful, though, and to this day the word is still used as a label by the judgemental and/or elderly for the kind of woman they would unhesitatingly describe as “no better than she should be.”

Oleanders thrive in stony ground