Amaranth is the name which has been given to the genus of plants of
which Prince’s Feather and Love-Lies-Bleeding are species. This means
immortal and is the word used in the Epistle of St. Peter (v, 4),
the amaranthine crown of glory, or as translated in our version “the
crown of glory that fadeth not away.” Milton refers to the “immortal
amaranth, a flower which once in Paradise, fast by the Tree of Life
began to bloom.”
Ambrosia, the food of the gods, sometimes alluded to as drink, and
sometimes as a sweet-smelling ointment, was also referred to by
Dioscorides and Pliny as a herb, but it is not known what particular
plant they meant. It was reputed to be nine times sweeter than honey.
The herb Ambrose of the old herbalists was the Chenopodium Botrys, but
C. Ambroisioides (the oak of Jerusalem), the wild sage, and the field
parsley have also borne the name. The Ambroisia of modern botanists is
a plant of the wormwood kind.
Athanasia was abbreviated by the old herbalists into Tansy, and this
herb acquired the fame due to its distinguished designation. In
Lucian’s Dialogues of the Gods, Jupiter tells Hercules to take with him
the beautiful Ganymede, whom he has stolen from earth, “and when he has
drunk of Athanasia (immortality) bring him back, and he shall be our
cupbearer.” Naturally the ancients sought for that herb, Athanasia,
which would yield immortality.