Multiflora Rose—By Σ64 [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC BY 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)], from Wikimedia Commons
And yet there is because that’s what Grandma called them and I had seen them. They had to exist. I really doubted Grandma had discovered a new plant.
Years later I discovered a reference to something referred to as the multiflora rose. Based upon the discussion and the description, I thought it was odd that I had never heard of the plant before.
And then I saw the picture. There was Grandma’s mullable rose.
The word was not “mullable.” It was “multiflora.
Maybe I heard Grandma wrong. Maybe Grandma said it wrong. Maybe Grandma heard it wrong. Maybe all three.
When you can’t find that maiden name that Grandma insists is true consider how off the pronunciation may be.
5 Responses
Yes, I know the feeling. My mother always said her grandmother’s maiden name was Lucinda Hyphen Ladow. It was Lucinda Halpin Ladow. The Ladow part was after she was adopted.
Good point and great example!
My grandmother always insisted her great aunt’s name was Sa-fire-rah Southern accent), for which for years we had trouble finding. Eventually we connected with a descendant who revealed the name was Sophia.
Mulifloral Rose is considered an invasive species by the US Forest Service and many other state and federal agencies. It is a gardeners nightmare.
This goes for place names as well. My great-aunt told me she had gone to Norway to visit cousins in a place she called Nes-nes. I could not find this place anywhere on the map. However, I have since been given information through a relative’s tree that is was actually Nesna.