National Geographic Magazine/Volume 31/Number 6/Our State Flowers/The Syringa

The Syringa (Philadelphus lewisii Pursh)


The queen of Idaho's wild flower garden is by unanimous acclaim the modest syringa, Philadelphus lewisii, which is limited in its territory to the western group of States, from Montana and Wyoming to Washington and California. Its flowers matching the orange blossom in beauty, its bursting buds appearing to be fairly pin-cushions, its fragrance as delightful as the odors that sweep over Elysian fields, its leaves a delicate, soft, shimmering green, the Idaho syringa is a shrub well equipped to awaken enthusiasm in every lover of flowers.

The syringa belongs to the saxifrage family, which has some 250 species scattered throughout the North Temperate world. It has many close relatives—various species of Philadelphus, which is the botanical name for all the species we in our common garden variety of nomenclature call the syringas. There is Philadelphus grandiflorus, which grows in the South Atlantic States and is famous for its rich and fragrant flowers; Philadelphus inodorus, with the same range, but without the same fragrance; Philadelphus hirsutus, dwelling in the North Carolina-Alabama mountains and arraying itself in hairy leaves; Philadelphus coronarius, the mock orange of the Eastern States and everywhere loved for its beautiful and wonderfully fragrant blossoms.

The syringas are unfortunate in their popular name. Ptolemy Philadelphus loved them and they became Philadelphus this or Philadelphus that. But the world at large wanted a name more to popular liking and by common consent they became syringas. Now that would be all right if it did not happen that syringa is the botanical name of the lilac, to which family the popularly named syringas bear no relation.

Source: —, ed. (June 1917), “Our State Flowers: The Floral Emblems Chosen by the Commonwealths”, The National Geographic Magazine 31(6): 490–491. (Illustration from page 505.)