Flowers have played an important part in different cultures across the globe for centuries. The giving and receiving of flowers is a modern day ritual that resonates in disparate societies throughout the world.

Different flowers carry different meanings. Some flowers mean different things to different peoples; others seem to have picked up a near universal meaning.

The red rose is one such flower, and has come to symbolise romantic love and passion across the world. Roses have been cultivated in Asia for at least 5000 years, and current theories suggest that the rose as a species first evolved there.

This association has been long held in many societies, whatever cynics who question the validity of modern rituals like Valentine's Day might say. The classic ancient civilisations of Rome and Greece that in many ways gave birth to most modern European language and culture held the red rose to symbolise love, as embodied in the divine personifications of Venus and Aphrodite respectively.

Poppies are symbolic of death in several modern cultures. Poppies are the flowers used to commemorate the dead of the World Wars of the 20th century on Remembrance Day in Britain, France and the other Allied countries.

Again, these flowers carried a similar meaning in the ancient world. Both the Greek and Roman cultures of antiquity used the blood red poppy as an offering to the dead.

Flowers, then, accompany some of the big universal themes like love and death. Flowers can also be used simply to say: "I'm thinking of you," or "get well soon."

Just as the meanings of certain flowers seem to be the same almost everywhere, there are flower shops in Liverpool, Limerick and London that can help send that simple but unequivocal message: you have a friend who is thinking of you.

Maricruz Tennill is the author of this article about the symbolic meanings of flowers. To find flower shops in Liverpool and elsewhere, try looking online at sites like Interflora.