Why is the silk tree flower called the bitter love flower? An interpretation of the origin of its name

1. Pink Fan

Legend has it that there was a person named Pink Fan, who had a husband who was a scholar. This scholar studied for several years, and finally the time came when he could go to the capital to take the imperial examination for official rank. Before he left, Pink Fan pointed to the bitter love tree and told him that this journey would surely bring him success, but that there were too many flowers in the capital, and she hoped he would remember to come home. Her husband nodded and agreed, yet for a long time he did not return. Pink Fan waited day after day until her black hair turned white, and could only run to the bitter love tree at the end of her life and swear that if her husband changed his heart, this bitter love tree would bloom, with her husband as the leaves and her as the flowers, and only when the flowers withered could the leaves fall. The next year the tree indeed bore many flowers, and each flower was like a pink fan, except that it bloomed for only one day, and the leaves also opened and fell along with the flowers. From then on, the bitter love tree also had the name silk tree.

2. Ehuang and Nüying

It is said that Shun was at the Xiang River, and his wives Ehuang and Nüying searched for him in this area for a long time, but still did not find him. The two consorts wept bitterly by the river, and the tears they shed turned to blood, and only after all the blood was gone did they die. Afterwards, they and Shun's spirit together became this kind of tree.

3. Huanxi

A certain yuanwai had a daughter named Huanxi. When she grew to her teens she went to the southern mountains, and after returning she became absent-minded. The yuanwai sought famous doctors for her everywhere, and in the end she was cured by a scholar. It turned out that Huanxi had happened to see the scholar in the southern mountains, could not forget him, and fell ill with lovesickness, and the scholar found a silk tree in the southern mountains and gave her a water decoction of it, and only then did she recover.