The Stunningly Beautiful Black Roses of Halfeti. What a hard forum to navigate.
Neil
Those are also shown on this site which has more realistic photos. http://naturalgarden.org/the-black-rose/ Truthfully, that is what Taboo looks like in Newhall this time of year. Thatās why I described it as something Countess Dracula would adore on her dressing tableā¦black velvet with blood red centers. I can almost see her heart thumping in her chest! LOL!
Resurrecting an ancient thread again, because as famous as it is, I canāt find a clear explanation about this rose. It doesnāt seem to have an HMF listing.
Is it actually a specific cultivar? Is it a hybrid tea?
I remember reading somewhere that it might be related to Louis XIV or another china rose.
Then again other articles claimed that the color was due to the specific soil of Halfeti, and that the roses would be less black if grown elsewhere.
I read on yet another site that whatever it was is now lost and that the rose grown and sold there today is just Black Baccara.
Does anyone know a good source of information about what this rose really is?
Edited to add:
I found this video about it. The habit, foliage, repeat bloom, and color really remind me of my Louis XIV.
https://youtu.be/4ds2ipIvoNM
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Clearly this is just marketing hype. Any densely pigmented red rose will turn black when itās baked out in the desert sun. In this case it looks like they have a locally adapted Damask cultivar (Rosa Ć damascena) or close hybrid, not surprising given that Halfeti is, literally, on the road to Damascus.
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I love this topic and want to relive this conversation just for the fun and legend of it all.
In my twenties I visited a New York City shop that specialized in authentic essential oils collected from around the world many times in my travels. I was able to sample fragrant botanical oils from multiple different locations around the world.
One āroseā oil that quickly became one of my favorites was one labelled as āBlack Sudanese Roseā. Years later I would discover that the Sudanese Rose was actually the hibiscus. However none of the hibiscus I have grown or encountered have ever emitted any detectable scent.
Essential Oils are extracted via distillation or by saturating the physical petals in some form of viscous fat often lard. In the perfume industry this fragranced saturated fat is known as a āconcreteā. The far eastern exotic āattarsā are very energy-intensive proprietary mixtures of floral and botanicals that are heated in sealed vessels for very very long periods of time.
Sudanese Black Rose had a deep dark rich fragrance. I have never figured out what it was.
The damask rose is never all that dark red or even dark pink. and from the video, this rose does not seem to resemble a damask to me. It could be a hybridr form of Rose de Rescht or something like that but that is a Portland rose. None of the damasks approach a red and the rose in the video clearly resembles a china-origin rose blossom form.
My damask choices Leda and Omar Khayyam are total duds in their first year. Leda is perfoming a little better than Omar. I will not compost them yet- but I want flowers and I want to experience the fragrance of a true damask rose. Nuits de Young is pretty good, Indigo and Madame Isaac Periere entirely too sharp, dry and cat pissy. I didnāt hate them but not at all what I was expecting and I took deep whiffs up into my upper nose passages because the literature was telling me that Issac Periere was āraspberryā fragranced and Portlands had legendary fragrances. Yeah not so much.
A beautifully fragranced black rose would be legendary, Iconic but alas what to breed one from? Austinās the Prince is a superb fragrance and so is the Squire. (Iām only engaging in a fun thought experiment) If you were going to devote yourself to it what parents would you consider SeasideRooftop?
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I have no idea what produces the really dark reds. Based on the lineages posted on HMF, it seems āblackā can result from various combinations.
Black Baccara came from a dark red and a pink. Black Jade came from two oranges. Paul Bardenās Diablo Hawk has reds and oranges in its ancestry. Nigrette resulted from a cross of two not particularly dark reds. And Louis XIV is reportedly a seedling of General Jacqueminot, a deep pink/red HP.
So it seems there must be various ways to get there.
I currently have a single hip growing on Louis XIV which resulted from a hasty pollination I did with his neighbor Mamy Blueās pollen. I just wanted to see if LXIV was seed fertile. If the seeds germinate, I wonder what the combo of that very dark red and mauve will produce.
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This is also my opinion and I totally agree with you.
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Iāve found the website where I had seen the claim it was Louis XIV.
The article claims that:
āConducting research on the species known as āblack roseā in Turkey, Prof. Dr. Baytop sent information and photographs of the black roses grown in Halfeti to Martyn Rix, a British botanist who had special research on roses. As a result of his investigations, Rix concluded that the āBlack Halfeti Roseā was discovered by J.B.A. Guillot, one of the famous rose breeders who lived between 1827-1893. He identified it as the āLouis 14ā type produced by Guillot in 1859 in Lyon. It is unknown when and where the Black Halfeti rose, grown in Halfeti, came from. This type of rose, which is dark red in color close to black, semi-layered and fragrant, blooms in the first and autumn. The flowers of this species, which is a bush with a height of 1-1.5 meters, are 6-7 centimeters in diameter.ā
https://www.biyologlar.com/ana-sayfa/sanliurfa-halfeti-siyah-gul
Furthermore, I just noticed a 2022 publication that studied in vitro reproduction of the Halfeti rose. It explicitly refers to it as synonymous with Louis XIV.
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Rosesus you got some awesome hybrids with Rose de Rescht. I saw them on HMF.
Spill the details Please!
StrawChicagoAlkalineClayzone5 explicitly stated in her HMF posts that the Squire would lose its fragrance if the water source and soil were too acidic so when I prepared the barrel for the Squire- from James Mills sent ownroot- I made sure that it received a generous helping of biochar and pelletized lime and frequently choose tap water over rain barrel water to supplement itās water needs.
Squire IS the least greedy for water out of all the Austins and has STRONG own root vigor here. Itās absolutely healthy and breedable. Not just my love and attention toward it- it has innate strength and vigor.
The fragrance is superb truly on par with Papa Meilland. Itās controversial but my last few blooms have exceeded Papa Meilland. It truly is a fantastic fragrance.
Seaside Rooftop the data you have acquired also makes explicit mention of the quality of the soil being of what I suppose would be an alkaline soil and it playing a large role in the legendary fragrance of this rose. Hydrangeas are a species that soil pH plays a direct role in color expression. It seems the anecdotal experience is indicating it plays a role in rose fragrances for dark red roses. That being they prefer relatively alkaline conditions. Louis XIV has never come to America it would seem.
Geschwindās Grafin Estherhazy has intrigued me as a breeder rose. A starting point. I never seen it in person though.Anyone ever seen this rose?
If youād want a true damask scent Iād recommend Kazanlik. But Ispahan has almost the same fragrance and so does Porlandica/Duchess of Portland. I bought the latter as Officinalis, but it turned out to be Portlandica. A single to double flowered repeating rose with pear shaped Damask-hips. The scent is powerful for an almost single flower. Iāve a dozen planted in a bunch. On warm still morning the scent carries a few meters. I really appreciate this in a rose. She also is really tough and quite drought tolerant once settled.
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