Why are those tiny, white flowers that grace bouquets called baby’s breath? Some people say they like newborn’s breath, but the name may simply reflect the fact that these blossoms are small and delicate. Their genus name, Gypsophila, literally means “gypsum-loving,” reflecting the fact that baby’s breath thrives in gypsum-rich soil. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Why Are They Called Baby’s Breath Flowers?”
Hi there, you have A Way with Words.
Hi, how are you doing?
Hi, I’m doing well. Who are you and where are you calling from?
My name is Jess Rodriguez and I am calling from Keller, Texas.
Welcome to the show, Jess. What can we do for you?
Well, last year, my husband and I were talking about our newborn son, his fingers, his toes, and his baby’s breath, his little breath.
And it kind of got us talking about where the flower, I guess, baby’s breath, gets its name.
And I wanted to know, is there some kind of correlation between the two?
And that’s why I’m calling you today.
Do you have theories?
No, not really.
For some reason, to me, it sounded kind of Victorian.
Maybe it had something to do with lace.
But, you know, that’s really all I couldn’t actually come up with.
And what’s your baby’s breath like?
You know, he’s actually got like morning breath because he’s a little bit older.
But back then, you know, when he was newborn, he was, I mean, perfect, right?
Of course.
Right, and then reality sets in.
Of course, and then reality sets in.
Then he falls off the bed a couple times, and he’s got some dents and scratches.
He wakes you up in the middle of the night a few times, yeah.
Did it smell like baby’s breath flowers?
I mean, I assume that you smelled those and tried to see if there was a similarity.
You know, it’s funny.
I used to be a florist way back in the day, and I used to work with baby’s breath a lot, and I did not think that they smelled similar whatsoever.
I mean, you know, maybe just my son’s breath doesn’t smell like that.
I don’t know.
Maybe it doesn’t smell like flowers.
Well, some people do think that there’s a similarity.
There’s a gentleness about the smell of the plant and the smell of baby’s breath.
It’s not so much that they’re the same.
It’s just the lightness of it.
Does that make sense?
The softness of it.
The subtle.
The subtleness of it.
And other people just say that they’re both, they kind of catch you unawares.
But I think a lot of this is just people just trying to make the correlation after the fact.
So the plant itself, this plant itself is fairly insubstantial, right?
Super fragile, right?
It’s not the hardiest of plants at all.
Since the mid-1800s, the plant has had that name and been used in flower arrangements.
There’s a lot of different varieties of it, subspecies and species of it.
The Latin name of it is interesting, if you’re interested in that.
Yes, I am.
Gypsophila paniculata means gypsum lover.
The gypsophila does because it prefers a lime-based soil, and the paniculata refers to the spreading flower clusters, the way that they branch out, kind of these clusters.
All right, okay.
And I’m sure if you were doing flower arranging, I mean the baby’s breath in an arrangement, you don’t just hand somebody an arrangement of baby’s breath, right?
No.
It’s just a little fillip, a little accent.
And from a distance, it’s kind of hard to make out when it’s amongst the other flowers, right?
Mm—
Baby’s breath.
It’s kind of just a space filler that doesn’t, it goes unnoticed, really.
Yeah, it’s very gentle in its arrangement.
Like, it’s very soft.
It doesn’t make a big presence.
So I guess the bottom line is that we don’t really have a firm etymology on baby’s breath, but we can speculate.
There’s something about the subtleness, though, that perhaps…
The subtleness.
That makes sense.
Yeah, invited the comparison.
Yeah.
Jess, thank you so much for your call.
Well, that answers my question.
All right.
Take care.
Thanks for coming.
Thank you, guys.
Bye-bye.
All right.
Bye-bye.
Bye-bye.
Baby head flowers.
That’s what I want.
That’s smell the top of a baby’s head.
That was the smell that I always loved.
Oh, oh, oh.
That would be good, right?
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
When you’re holding them and you bend the nose down and you inhale.
Yeah.
Oh, that’s the best.
Yeah, boy.
Even when they’re not at their best, when they haven’t recently bathed.
Something about a baby.
Right, the top of their head.
Top of their head.
I don’t know what it is.
