Annunciation lily
- noun
- Artists often depict the Virgin Mary holding an Annunciation lily in religious paintings.
Examples
-
The delicate fragrance of the Annunciation lily filled the church during the festival.
-
The Annunciation lily blooms every spring in our garden.
-
The Annunciation lily blooms beautifully in spring.
-
Have you seen the Annunciation lilies in the garden?
-
Artists often depict the Virgin Mary holding an Annunciation lily in religious paintings.
-
The delicate fragrance of the Annunciation lily filled the church during the festival.
-
The Annunciation lily blooms every spring in our garden.
Synonyms
A plant with large white funnel-shaped flowers and a strong sweet smell
A large white garden flower with wide trumpet-shaped blooms
A white spring flower with broad funnel-shaped petals from the eastern Mediterranean
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase is compositionally transparent: it denotes a lily associated with the Annunciation (the religious event) so a learner who knows 'Annunciation' and 'lily' can infer it refers to a type/symbolic lily linked to that event. This type of event/place + plant naming is a regular, cross-linguistic pattern and follows standard English noun-compound composition, making the meaning predictable for B1 learners who know the constituents.
Etymology
Annunciation lily gets its name from old church pictures of the angel telling Mary the news called the 'Annunciation', where Mary often holds a white lily as a sign of 'purity'. That's why the flower is linked with Mary and with church art today.