With cheerful red bracts and delicate yellow flowers framed against velvety green leaves, colorful poinsettias are an indisputable symbol of Christmas. In fact, poinsettias are the most commercially important potted plant in the world because of their endearing association with the December holiday season. But how did this warm-weather shrub native to western Mexico become so closely associated with Christmas?

The original Nahuatl name for the plant we call “poinsettia” is Cuetlaxóchitl, cultivated by the Aztecs long before the European colonization of the Americas. The Aztecs used Cuetlaxóchitl for a variety of purposes, including decoration and the production of red and purple dyes, as well as for medicines derived from the plant’s milky white sap.

In 1828, Cuetlaxóchitl was taken from its native home and brought to the United States by Joel Roberts Poinsett, the U.S. Ambassador to Mexico. After successfully cultivating the unique plant in his South Carolina greenhouse, Poinsett began sharing the plant with friends and colleagues who marveled at the plant’s colorful transformation during the holiday season.

But less than a decade after being introduced to the United States, Cuetlaxóchitl came to be known by its most enduring name: poinsettia, after the man who first appropriated the plant from Mexico. Poinsett is celebrated for introducing the poinsettia flower to the United States and for co-founding the Smithsonian Institution. However, his legacy as a slave owner and his role in the displacement of countless Native Americans has led some people today to reject the name “poinsettia” in favor of the plant’s Native name, Cuetlaxóchitl.

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