December 12#: National Poinsettia Day

National Poinsettia Day is a day to celebrate the ever popular vibrant red flower that add a cheerful touch to homes during the holiday season.
Poinsettia plants are native to Central America, especially an area of southern Mexico known as ‘Taxco del Alarcon’ where they flower during the winter.
But where is the Poinsettia from, and how did it become a Christmas staple?
To find out where the flower originated from, we have to take a look in the past.
In 1480 to his death, Aztec King Montezuma adorned his palace with Poinsettia, or Cuetlaxochitl, as it was known by the Aztecs, having his people cultivate the flower as a gift from the Gods.
It was served as a reminder of the sacrifice that the gods had made to create the universe and that the debt would be repaid in human sacrifices.
Moreover, the Aztecs used the Poinsettia’s sap to cure fevers and the leaves to make a purple dye for clothes and cosmetics.
Then, in the 17th century after the Conquistadors invaded Mexico, the blood red wild flower became a part of Christian ceremony for the first time when it was used in the nativity procession, the Fiesta of Santa Pesebre. It’s around this time that many legends originated, attempting to explain why the plant, beginning to be called “La flor de Nochebuena,” or Holy Night had acquired its bright and beautiful red color.

There is also an old Mexican legend about how Poinsettias and Christmas come together.
There was once a poor Mexican girl called Pepita who had no present to give the baby Jesus at the Christmas Eve Services.
As she walked to the chapel her cousin Pedro tried to cheer her up.
“Pepita”, he said “I’m sure that even the smallest gift, given by someone who loves him will make Jesus Happy.”
However, Pepita didn’t know what she could give, so she picked a small handful of weeds from the roadside and made them into a small bouquet.
She felt embarrassed because she could only give this small present to Jesus.
As she walked through the chapel to the altar, though, she remembered what Pedro had said and she began to feel better, knelt down and put the bouquet at the bottom of the nativity scene.
Suddenly, the bouquet of weeds burst into bright red flowers, and everyone who saw them were sure they had seen a miracle. From that day on, the bright red flowers were known as the ‘Flores de Noche Buena’, or ‘Flowers of the Holy Night’.
The shape of the poinsettia flower and leaves are sometimes thought as a symbol of the Star of Bethlehem which led the Wise Men to Jesus.
The red colored leaves symbolize the blood of Christ, while the white leaves represent his purity.

Either way, after being discovered in 1828 by Joel Roberts Poinsett, the poinsettia became a popular specimen among botanists. He was the first Ambassador from the USA to Mexico in 1825, and he had some greenhouses on his plantations in South Carolina. While visiting the Taxco area in 1828, he became very interested in the plants, and he immediately sent some of the plants back to South Carolina, where he began growing the plants, sending them to friends and botanical gardens.
One in particular by the name of Wilenow, in 1833 he named the Poinsettia “Euporbia pulcherrima” but, after only four years, another botanist by the name of William Hickling Prescott renamed the flower to “Poinsettia pulcherrima” in honor of the man who brought the flower back to be studied, Joel Poinsett.
Robert Buist, a plants-man from Pennsylvania saw the flower and he was probably the first person to have sold the poinsettias under their botanical, or latin name, name ‘Euphorbia pulcherrima’ (it means, ‘the most beautiful Euphorbia’), and they were first sold as cut flowers.
It was only in the early 1900s that they were sold as whole plants for landscaping and pot plants. The Ecke family from Southern California were one of, if not, the first to sell them as whole plants and they’re still the main producer of the plants in the USA.

To celebrate National Poinsettia Day, the Poinsettia is displayed on the Dia de le Virgen, or Virgin’s Day on December 12th in Mexico. In the United States, there are parades that include Poinsettias to commemorate Joel Poinsett’s discovery of the plant in the month of December, the Poinsettia is also a national emblem of Madagascar.