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Delphinium peregrinum
Violet larkspur is a erect annual wildflower from the eastern Mediterranean and western Asia, known for deep purple to lavender flowers borne on long stalks. It is a wild species of fields and garrigue rather than a common garden plant, so it is grown mainly for its native interest.
Delphinium peregrinum, also commonly known as violet larkspur, is a Eurasian flowering plant, belonging to the genus Delphinium, endemic to Turkey, the Eastern Mediterranean and Western Irano-Turanian region, bearing an erect, annual stem with glabrous compound leaves and reaching a height of 27–35 cm. The plant, which blossoms between April and August, bears five colorful sepals (calyx), petaloid, the posterior sepal spurred, the two lateral sepals and the two lower sepals without spurs; while the anterior sepals can either be fused or separated. The inflorescence (corollas) are sparsely arranged, irregular, and are borne on long pedicels subtended by bracts.
The plant is readily recognized by its deep purple to lavender-coloured flowers which resemble scorpion tails (scorpioid). Flowers are pollinated by bumblebees.
The stems, bulbous root, seeds (contained within 1–5 separate follicles) and leaves of the plant all contain toxins, namely, saponins and alkaloids that act on the nervous system and suppress it. The toxins are harmful to livestock when consumed by them, and have been known to pass through drinking milk, or by eating the flesh of animals that have eaten from the plant.
Medieval physician, Al-Tamimi, mentions a plant of its description growing in Palestine, and where he states that in the region of Syria (the Levant) the plant was given as an antidote to those bitten by venomous snakes and to persons stung by scorpions, the plant being ingested by them in the form of an elixir or potion, and the neurological reaction being such that it automatically cured all patients bitten or stung by these venomous creatures. Dioscorides (1st-century CE), in his Materia Medica, mentions the same thing about the flowering plant Delphinion. Science today has yet to test the effects of the plant's toxins on treating snake-bites.
The plant grows in heavy soils, in fields where there is ample sunlight and where there is plenty of rainfall. In Israel / Palestine, it also grows on chalkstone terraces, as well as on loess soil. It is found growing in, both, cultivated and uncultivated fields, in garrigue, and in almost every place of the country.
Doubtful knight's-spur · Royal knight's-spur · Scarlet larkspur · Garden delphiniums · Candle larkspur · Siberian larkspur · Rocky Mountain larkspur · Larkspur
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Delphinium peregrinum by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
