Bring Roses, Violets, and the cold Snow-Drop (...)

While working today on one unidentified epigraph of The Italian, Chapter 11 Vol 1 - I may have struck gold. I painstackingly unearthed a popular engraving of yore (ca1590) which does resonate with Radcliffe's flowery prose.

It may refer to the following engraving

Indeed, exactly like for the "Missa Ferte Rosas" by Menault (1642-1694), the epigraph may be a reference to this exact engraving (one of which was acquired by the British Museum in 1835), and specifically to its inscription "Ferte Rosas [...] Foeno."

Engraving comes from masses dating back to Baroque period. Inscription translates exactly to: Bring roses and violets speedily, offer lilies fallen from the celestial orb, the child lies on lowly straw. When read properly, the lilies are fallen from the sky, not the child ! Ann replaces the lilies (here symbols of Prayers) by snowdrops, for purity/innocence + hope, which are now fitting for Ellena, then forced into noviciation. (roses = charity and love ; violets = humility). But Ann, repurposing the epigraph from Jesus to Ellena, wickedly, completely reverts the Joy of nativity to the Mourning of a loss, both in the epigraph with "tears" and in the chapter (knell of death, last sacrament, plaintive, hollow notes, sorrow, pall of black velvet...). In the Renaissance, the prayers from Virgin Mary (or here the Shepherds) to the infant Jesus were sometimes compared to lilies fallen from the sky. That's why the lilies (metaphor) are "offered" but the roses and violets (actual flowers) are "brought". In conclusion; this epigraph may or may not be a reference to this very popular engraving of yore.