Monticello Gardens

Common name: Lent Lily, Wild Daffodil, Trumpet Daffodil

Family: Amaryllidaceae (Amaryllis)

Life form: Geophyte (bulb, corm or tuber)

Usage: Ornamental

Comments: This species, which can naturalize in the landscape, is native to England and was the “golden flower” that inspired the poetry of William Wordsworth. The flowers are downward facing, and the paler yellow corolla petals are slightly twisted. In 1816 Jefferson asked his daughter Martha Randolph to send “daffodils, jonquils, Narcissuses” to him at Poplar Forest. Jefferson did not specify the varieties, but the Lent Lily is a likely candidate.