In the spring of 1594 the first tulips bloomed in the Netherlands. It was a case of the right thing in the right place at the right time. The Dutch went crazy for tulips. They experienced "Tulipomania," a financial speculation and market collapse that is still studied by economists. They launched an industry that is world famous, now accounting for 90% of the world's tulip production.

They also created art that will endure for all time.

Famous Dutch painters, including Jan Brueghel the Elder, were so taken with the tulip, that they worked them into masterful still-life paintings. Tulips and art became so intertwined that a whole class of tulips has come to be called "Rembrandt tulips" — though, curiously, Rembrandt himself was not known for floral subjects.

The "bouquet paintings," as they came to be known, all shared one curious fact: few of the bouquets depicted ever existed. They simply couldn't have, for one reason: the flowers shown together do not bloom at the same time of year.

It was, as they say, a bit of artistic license.

Today, however, these odd pairings wouldn't raise an eyebrow. Thanks to the wonders of modern day "forcing" techniques, tulips and other flowers can be "fooled" to bloom out-of-season — nearly any time of year — by careful manipulation of light and temperature conditions.

TULIPS

BY BARBARA SCHULMAN - PART 5

Growing trade with non-European economies, the rise in new learning and scientific experimentation, and a boom in the market for luxury goods are all aspects of early modern Europe that are demonstrated in the history of the tulip. Thus, the tulip truly stands out as a cultural symbol of Europe during the time of the flower’s heyday.

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