This Phoenician festival appears to have been a vernal one, for its
date was determined by the discoloration of the river Adonis, and
this has been observed by modern travellers to occur in spring. At
that season the red earth washed down from the mountains by the rain
tinges the water of the river, and even the sea, for a great way
with a blood-red hue, and the crimson stain was believed to be the
blood of Adonis, annually wounded to death by the boar on Mount
Lebanon. Again, the scarlet anemone is said to have sprung from the
blood of Adonis, or to have been stained by it; and as the anemone
blooms in Syria about Easter, this may be thought to show that the
festival of Adonis, or at least one of his festivals, was held in
spring. The name of the flower is probably derived from Naaman
("darling"), which seems to have been an epithet of Adonis. The
Arabs still call the anemone "wounds of the Naaman." The red rose
also was said to owe its hue to the same sad occasion; for
Aphrodite, hastening to her wounded lover, trod on a bush of white
roses; the cruel thorns tore her tender flesh, and her sacred blood
dyed the white roses for ever red.
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