Periwinkle Tattoo Meaning

Memory, early friendship, and the bloom that persists beneath everything else.

The Periwinkle is the flower of memory and persistence — the small, steady blue bloom on its low creeping vine, the flower of tender recollection and early friendship, woven into garlands for the dead and worn as a charm against evil, the plant that covers the ground and keeps what lies beneath. To carry the Periwinkle is to carry memory, early friendship, and the bloom that persists beneath everything else — the flower of first feelings and faithful recollection, the evergreen creeper of graves and of magic, the steady blue that endures.

The periwinkle is the flower of tender recollections and early friendship — the small, steady blue bloom associated with memory, and especially with the gentle remembrance of beginnings. It is the flower of the first feelings, the innocent beginnings: first friendships, first affections, the early bonds and emotions of life that are remembered, often, more clearly and more fondly than later ones. The periwinkle holds the sweetness of these early, formative attachments and the act of looking back upon them with tenderness.

There is a reason the periwinkle suits this meaning so well: it is a humble, modest flower, simple and unpretentious in its small blue blooms — and the innocent beginnings it represents are remembered more clearly for their simplicity. The first feelings of life have a clarity and purity that later, more complicated experiences lack; like the plain blue flower, they are uncomplicated, and so they stay vivid in memory. The periwinkle is thus the bloom of fond, tender remembrance — the flower one associates with recalling early friendships and first affections, with the gentle act of memory turned toward the simple, formative beginnings of the heart. It is the keeper of first things, the small blue flower of the cherished past, of recollections held softly and beginnings remembered with love. The periwinkle is the flower of tender memory and early friendship — the first feelings remembered for their simplicity. The universal periwinkle is the flower of tender recollection — the flower of tender recollections and early friendship, the bloom associated with the first feelings, the innocent beginnings that are remembered more clearly for their simplicity; the small, steady blue flower of memory turned fondly toward beginnings — first friendships, first affections, the early formative bonds remembered more vividly and tenderly than later ones, the first feelings having a clarity and purity that later experiences lack, the periwinkle the keeper of first things and the cherished past, recollections held softly and beginnings remembered with love.

Vinca minor (lesser periwinkle) is native to central and southern Europe and has been used in European folk medicine and symbolism for centuries. The name periwinkle has uncertain etymology — possibly from the Latin pervincire (to bind completely) or from Old English. The plant spreads by runners in a dense ground cover that chokes out competing plants, giving it associations with persistence, with the thing that will not be removed, with memory that underlies other experiences. In Victorian flower language it meant 'tender recollections' and 'early friendship.' The plant contains vincamine, a compound that has been studied for its effects on cerebral circulation. The Madagascar periwinkle (Catharanthus roseus) — a different species — produces vinblastine and vincristine, chemotherapy drugs used to treat leukemia.

Periwinkle across cultures

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