Some say that the best view of the lilac blue with which the jacaranda trees paint Lisbon at this time of year is from the Tagus. It could be, because the city and its opening to the sea has everything to do with the history of these trees in the city.
It was with the lullaby of the winds that brought the boats back to the Tagus that the seeds of the jacaranda trees also came, in the beginning of the 19th century. They came from Brazil. First, to integrate the collection of the Jardim Botânico da Ajuda. Then, to be spread across the city.
The mimosa jacaranda is a tree species that, in Lisbon, is noticed in the period before the summer, announcing it. It dispenses with the leaves at the end of April so that, from May to June, it paints the capital with lilac blue spots, embracing squares and streets. It is an exotic tree, native to Argentina, Bolivia and Paraguay, which has adapted to the climate.
Because man likes to assume the role of a bird, dispersing seeds since he began, like them, to travel the world, it is said that this feat of bringing jacarandas to Lisbon was carried out by Felix Avelar Brotero, none other than the father of botany in Portugal, having directed the Jardim Botânico da Ajuda from 1811 to 1826. As a good practice, which he inherited from his times in Paris, similarly to what he did with other species, he also offered the seeds of this tree to anyone who wanted to cultivate around the city . After all, he had them at hand to sow.
Dalila EspÃrito Santo, the engineer who also directed this Botanical Garden from 2002 to 2019, confirms that Brotero, to encourage planting, advertised: “It’s a beautiful tree for Lisbon”. Something that, for the former director, serves as proof of her role in spreading the species that is all over the city.
Interestingly, the introduction of the plant precedes the return of the court to Brazil, at a time when the blue spectrum pigments were extremely valuable. For royalty, this plant, due to its exoticism, had a non-tradable value: it was a way of demonstrating royal power. “Exotic elements, such as rosewood, served as a television genre at the time”, explains the expert.
It is not by chance that the king d. João 6º, when he returns to Portugal, decides that the Botanical Garden should open every Thursday to the public. If it still impresses us today, despite the stimuli to which we are exposed, imagine yourself at the time.
There is another secret that, in our times, is only known to scholars and the attentive: the two trees in the Botanical Garden, perhaps because they were the first to be acclimatized to Lisbon, are the last to bloom in the city, which perhaps reassures them that will have a more exuberant flowering than the others, which grew out of them one day. This year, flowers appeared around the city in the first week of May.
The heat brings the purple flowers to the jacarandas
The mimoso jacaranda seems to be in counter-cycle due to its posture, both in leaf deciduousness and in flowering. But gardener Nuno Prates clarifies that “the tree is being consistent with its cycle, having a fleeting period without leaves.” Flowering awakens with the temperature that would have the same effect in Latin America, and which is only reached here in the summer announcement of a late spring.
This need for high temperatures prevents the tree from being a good choice for areas north of the Tagus – that’s why it stays here, in Lisbon. Nuno also explains that, in a subtle way, this species typically blooms a second time, here or on the other side of the Atlantic, following the seasons and temperatures.
Although Lisbon is famous for its jacaranda trees, the real jacaranda capital of the world is Pretoria, South Africa – also far from its origins. Some botany books claim that the Portuguese were responsible for disseminating this species there, as well as in other countries and continents. Anyway, in these parts, because the conditions for its flowering are met at the time of exams, superstition says that the fall of a flower on the head, something quite likely, means luck.
Argentine poets, attentive to sounds that only certain ears hear, swear that these trees sing tangos to those who pass under their crowns. Here, on another note, Eugênio de Andrade sang a poem to them: “I don’t know of another glory, another paradise: at your entrance the jacarandas are in bloom, one on each side./ And a smile, a peaceful abode, waiting for me. / The space all around multiplies its mirrors, opens balconies to the sea./ It’s like in the most childish dreams: I can fly almost close to the high clouds – brother of the birds –, get lost in the air.”
A reason for an ode to the famous poet and a delight for many people from Lisbon, the jacaranda will continue, however, to be the tree of our discord: sometimes because of the odor that everyone doesn’t like, sometimes because of the idea that it gets dirty – sidewalks and parked cars. It may be important to know that the tree is especially important for the urban environment, more than for beautification, for the environment. And that their resilience to the two main attacks they are subject to: pruning and pollution depends on that.
For those who are in Lisbon…
Until the end of June, the jacarandas in bloom can be seen, without invitation, in the most diverse corners of Lisbon, but the main highlights are Largo do Rato, Parque Eduardo 7º, Largo do Carmo, Av. D. Carlos 1º and Av. of the Tower of Belem. But if for some reason it escapes your sight now, remember that the tree will bloom again in September. More timidly, perhaps because of the cold, without removing the leaves again so that the lilac blue would stand out.
