Flora, Les fleurs dans l'Antiquité: précédé d'un entretien avec Alain Baraton. 2017. (Signets Belles Lettres, 28). illus. XIII, 319 p. Broché.- In French.

One flower makes spring: the Ancients saw it as a symbol of nature, its beauty and inexhaustible vitality, but also its fragility. With every step taken by the nymph Flora, an infinite variety of hyacinths blossom. Flowers are everywhere. They inspire love, whether during an abduction in a field or a wedding ceremony. One cannot attend a banquet without being adorned, crowned and garlanded with flowers to better drink and converse. Flowers have a thousand uses and are present on a thousand occasions. The language of ancient writers reflects this passion for flowers through a profusion of floral metaphors and images. Some two hundred excerpts from Greek and ancient authors. Intoxicated by colours, shapes and scents, the reader is invited to choose from among the flowers in this bouquet those that will make up their own. Bringing together nearly 200 excerpts from Greek and Latin authors, classified by theme and accompanied by a chronology at the top of each page to better situate the texts, this anthology transforms Antiquity into a garden where myth and the extraordinary rub shoulders with everyday life.