refer to the association with the religious feast of Candlemas (February 2) - the optimum flowering time of the plant - at which young women, robed in white, would walk in solemn procession in commemoration of the Purification of the Virgin, an alternative name for the feast day. The French name of refers to Candlemas, while an Italian name, , refers to purification. The German name of (little snow bells) invokes the symbol of bells. In the language of flowers, the snowdrop is synonymous with 'hope' (and the goddess Persephone's/Proserpina's return from Hades), as it blooms in early springtime, just before the vernal equinox, and so, is seen as 'heralding' the new spring and new year. In more recent times, the snowdrop was adopted as a symbol of sorrow and of hope following the Dunblane massacre in Scotland, and lent its name to the subsequent campaign to restrict the legal ownership of handguns in the UK. See also List of snowdrop gardens References Bibliography Books Chapter 2. Alan Meerow. Taxonomy and Phylogeny. pp. 17–55 Chapters Historical (chronological) (see also, Naturalis Historia) (see also, Bucolics) see also Species Plantarum (see Encyclopédie méthodique) Articles Websites Images , in , in Organisations Further reading Articles Websites External links Amaryllidaceae genera Medicinal plants Amaryllidoideae Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus