Lotus (plant)

See also: Lotus

In Botanical, the lotus , whose name derives from the Greek lottos by the Latin lotus , indicates various plants, trees, shrubs or grasses, terrestrial or watery, which bore already this name in the Antiquité. The lotuses preserve clean sheets thanks to the Effet lotus: the water drops slip along the sheets without being spread out thanks to microasperities.

Various lotuses

The various plants which could be called lotus by the old or modern authors, and which one finds the trace in the botanical nomenclature appear to be as follows:

(French names; vulgar Latin names ; scientific names )

  • arborescent Lotuses
    • Jujube tree, tree of the Lotophage S; Lotus, Lotus africanus, Lotophagorum arbor, Lotus sine nucleo ; Ziziphus lotus (L.) Lam. (syn. Rhamnus Lotus L.), Rhamnacée S
    • Spine of Chris, Jujube tree of Palestine; Lotus paliurus, Paliurus cyrenaïcus ; Ziziphus spina-christi (L.) Desf. (syn. Rhamnus Spina-Christi L.); Rhamnacée S
    • Micocoulier of Provence; Lotus italica, Celtis ; Celtis australis L.; Ulmaceous S
    • Persimmon tree, false-sweet clover; Lotus, sive Faba græca ; Diospyros lotus L.; Ébènacée S
  • watery herbaceous Lotuses
    • Lotus crowned, Indian lotus, broad bean of Egypt, lily of the Nile; Lotus crowned, Faba ægyptiaca ; Nelumbo nucifera Gaertn. (syn. Nymphæa Nelumbo L.); Nélumbonacée S.
    • Lotus of America, yellow lotus; unknown plant of old the ; Nelumbo lutea Willd. ; Nélumbonacée S.
    • Lotus of Egypt; Lotus, sive Colocasium ; Nymphaea lotus L., Nymphaéacée S
    • blue Lotus; Lotus…. (cyaneus) ; Nymphaea caerulea Savigny ; Nymphaéacée S
  • terrestrial herbaceous Lotuses
    • Taro, colocase, cabbage of China; Colocasium Niliacum olus ; Colocasia esculenta (L.) Schott (syn. Colocasia antiquorum Schott ; Arum Colocasia L.); Aracée S

Among all these plants, that which corresponds to the lotus of the current language is the crowned lotus or nélombo, Nelumbo will nucifera Gaertn., family of the Nélumbonacée S.

To note that the kind Lotus which gathers the Lotier S, belongs to the family of the Fabacée S and includes/understands common fodder plants in the meadows. The two terms thus should not be confused.

The lotus in Buddhism

In the Bouddhisme the flower of lotus is emblematic of Bouddha. In all the Indian world one counts very many paintings, sculptures and representations of the flower of lotus. This is due to the single characteristic of the lotus which is only the watery Plante whose flower is with the top of water contrary to the Nénuphar S and other cousins whose flower floats on water. This image, connoting lightness, of the flower rising with the top of water surface joined that of Buddha so light which it puts back on a cat with the top of the ground.

The symbolic system of the lotus in Buddhism still concerns owing to the fact that the seed and the flower appear together, it acts of simultaneity the cause (the seed) and the effect (the flower) in the law of causality of the universe which is one of the major concept of Buddhist philosophy. For that it is necessary to add that the lotus draws its vital substance in mud to open out, indeed, with the top of water. Thus " the boue" represent the sufferings, the disorders, the desires, which are the compost even of our blooming. It is thus possible to transform its karma by the illumination, the attack of the boddheity, thanks to our awakening with the law of causality.

See too

  • Lotus is the name of kind of the Lotier, plant of the family of the Fabacées.

Related article

External bonds

  • a page of the university Pierre and Marie Curie.

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