chrysanthemum

"In place of the abstract expressions 'the time when I was happy,' 'the time when I was loved,' which he had often used before then without suffering too much since his intelligence had not embodied in them anything of the past save fictitious extracts which preserved none of the reality, he now recovered everything that had fixed unalterably the specific, volatile essence of that lost happiness; he could see it all: the snowy, curled petals of the chrysanthemum which she had tossed after him into his carriage, which he had kept pressed to his lips—the address 'Maison Dorée; embossed on the note-paper on which he had read 'My hand trembles so as I write to you'—the contraction of her eyebrows when she said pleadingly: 'You won't leave it too long before getting in touch with me?'; he could smell the heated iron of the barber whom he used to have singe his hair while Loredan went to fetch the little seamstress; could feel the showers which fell so often that spring, the ice-cold homeward drive in his victoria, by moonlight; all the network of mental habits, of seasonal impressions, of sensory reactions, which had extended over a series of weeks its uniform meshes in which his body found itself inextricably caught."
-- Swann's Way by Marcel Proust, translated by C.K. Scott Moncrieff and Terence Kilmartin, pp 375-376 of the Vintage International paperback edition

I never heard that before, sionnach, but wouldn't it be because the chrysanthemum is a symbol of Japan? I know the navy in WWII put enormous gold chrysanthemums on the bows of their ships. (Some of them were 7-8 feet across.) I can't think of a similar term in reference to any western monarchies, but surely there is one...?

It has always puzzled me why the Japanese throne is referred to as the chrysanthemum throne.

Video Scene (seconds 3:41-3:48) // Transcript

SCENE: The schoolhouse.
MR. PHILLIPS: Alright, let's begin the spelling bee. Miss Andrews, can you give us the spelling of the word chrysanthemum?
PRISSY ANDREWS: Chrysanthemum. C-h-i, no r-i -s -a -n-s-m -u-m.
MR. PHILLIPS: Perhaps we'll turn our attention to your spelling now that you mathematics is well in hand. Gilbert, chrysanthemum.
GILBERT: Chrysanthemum. C-h-r-y-s-a-n-t-h-a-m-u-m.
MR. PHILLIPS: Hmm. Anne?
ANNE: Chrysanthemum. C-h-r-y-s-a-n-t-h-e-m-u-m.
MR. PHILLIPS: Correct.