The Spanish hyacinth (H. amethystinus) and H. azureus are charming little bulbs for growing in masses in the rock garden or front of the flower border. The older botanists included in the genus Hyacinthus species of Muscari, Scilla and other genera of bulbous Liliaceae, and the name of hyacinth is still popularly applied to several other bulbous plants. Thus Muscari botryoides is the grape hyacinth, 6 in., blue or white, the handsomest; M. moschatum, the musk hyacinth, 10 in., has peculiar livid greenish-yellow flowers and a strong musky odour; M. comosum var. monstrosum, the feather hyacinth, bears sterile flowers broken up into a featherlike mass; M. racemosum, the starch hyacinth, is a native with deep blue plum-scented flowers. The Cape hyacinth is Galtonia candicans, a magnificent border plant, 3-4 ft. high, with large drooping white bell-shaped flowers; the star hyacinth, Scilla amoena; the Peruvian hyacinth or Cuban lily, S. peruviana, a native of the Mediterranean region, to which Linnaeus gave the species name peruviana on a mistaken assumption of its origin; the wild hyacinth or blue-bell, known variously as Endymion nonscriptum, Hyacinthus nonscriptus or Scilla nutans; the wild hyacinth of western North America, Camassia esculenta. They all flourish in good garden soil of a gritty nature.
HYACINTH, or Jacinth, in mineralogy, a variety of zircon (q.v.) of yellowish red colour, used as a gem-stone. The hyacinthus of ancient writers must have been our sapphire, or blue corundum, while the hyacinth of modern mineralogists may have been the stone known as lyncurium (λυγκούριον). The Hebrew word leshem, translated ligure in the Authorized Version (Ex. xxviii. 19), from the λιγύριον of the Septuagint, appears in the Revised Version as jacinth, but with a marginal alternative of amber. Both jacinth and amber may be reddish yellow, but their identification is doubtful. As our jacinth (zircon) is not known in ancient Egyptian work, Professor Flinders Petrie has suggested that the leshem may have been a yellow quartz, or perhaps agate. Some old English writers describe the jacinth as yellow, whilst others refer to it as a blue stone, and the hyacinthus of some authorities seems undoubtedly to have been our sapphire. In Rev. xx. 20 the Revised Version retains the word jacinth, but gives sapphire as an alternative.
Most of the gems known in trade as hyacinth are only garnets—generally the deep orange-brown hessonite or cinnamon-stone—and many of the antique engraved stones reputed to be hyacinth are probably garnets. The difference may be detected optically, since the garnet is singly and the hyacinth doubly refracting; moreover the specific gravity affords a simple means of diagnosis, that of garnet being only about 3.7, whilst hyacinth may have a density as high as 4.7. Again, it was shown many years ago by Sir A. H. Church that most hyacinths, when examined by the spectroscope, show a series of dark absorption bands, due perhaps to the presence of some rare element such as uranium or erbium.
Hyacinth is not a common mineral. It occurs, with other zircons, in the gem-gravels of Ceylon, and very fine stones have been found as pebbles at Mudgee in New South Wales. Crystals of zircon, with all the typical characters of hyacinth, occur at Expailly, Le Puy-en-Velay, in Central France, but they are not large enough for cutting. The stones which have been called Compostella hyacinths are simply ferruginous quartz from Santiago de Compostella in Spain.
(F. W. R.*)
HYACINTHUS,[1] in Greek mythology, the youngest son of the Spartan king Amyclas, who reigned at Amyclae (so Pausanias iii. 1. 3, iii. 19. 5; and Apollodorus i. 3. 3, iii. 10. 3). Other stories make him son of Oebalus, of Eurotas, or of Pierus and the nymph Clio (see Hyginus, Fabulae, 271; Lucian, De saltatione, 45, and Dial. deor. 14). According to the general story, which is probably late and composite, his great beauty attracted the love of Apollo, who killed him accidentally when teaching him to throw the discus (quoit); others say that Zephyrus (or Boreas) out of jealousy deflected the quoit so that it hit Hyacinthus on the head and killed him. According to the representation on the tomb at Amyclae (Pausanias, loc. cit.) Hyacinthus was translated into heaven with his virgin sister Polyboea. Out of his blood there grew the flower known as the hyacinth, the petals of which were marked with the mournful exclamation AI, AI, “alas” (cf. “that sanguine flower inscribed with woe”). This Greek hyacinth cannot have been the flower which now bears the name: it has been identified with a species of iris and with the larkspur (Delphinium Aiacis), which appear to have the markings described. The Greek hyacinth was also said to have sprung from the blood of Ajax. Evidently the Greek authorities confused both the flowers and the traditions.
The death of Hyacinthus was celebrated at Amyclae by the second most important of Spartan festivals, the Hyacinthia, which took place in the Spartan month Hecatombeus. What month this was is not certain. Arguing from Xenophon (Hell. iv. 5) we get May; assuming that the Spartan Hecatombeus is the Attic Hecatombaion, we get July; or again it may be the Attic Scirophorion, June. At all events the Hyacinthia was an early summer festival. It lasted three days, and the rites gradually passed from mourning for Hyacinthus to rejoicings in the majesty of Apollo, the god of light and warmth, and giver of the ripe fruits of the earth (see a passage from Polycrates, Laconica, quoted by Athenaeus 139 d; criticized by L. R. Farnell, Cults of the Greek States, iv. 266 foll.). This festival is clearly connected with vegetation, and marks the passage from the youthful verdure of spring to the dry heat of summer and the ripening of the corn.
The precise relation which Apollo bears to Hyacinthus is obscure. The fact that at Tarentum a Hyacinthus tomb is ascribed by Polybius to Apollo Hyacinthus (not Hyacinthius) has led some to think that the personalities are one, and that the hero is merely an emanation from the god; confirmation is sought in the Apolline appellation τετράχειρ, alleged by Hesychius to have been used in Laconia, and assumed to describe a composite figure of Apollo-Hyacinthus. Against this theory is the essential difference between the two figures. Hyacinthus is a chthonian vegetation god whose worshippers are afflicted and sorrowful; Apollo, though interested in vegetation, is never regarded as inhabiting the lower world, his death is not celebrated in any ritual, his worship is joyous and triumphant, and finally the Amyclean Apollo is specifically the god of war and song. Moreover, Pausanias describes the monument at Amyclae as consisting of a rude figure of Apollo standing on an altar-shaped base which formed the tomb of Hyacinthus. Into the latter offerings were put for the hero before gifts were made to the god.