What is aronatus?

Answer 1

I'll twine 'mid the ringlets

Of my raven black hair,

The lilies so pale

And the roses so fair,

The myrtle so bright

With an emerald hue,

And the pale aronatus

With eyes of bright blue.

- "I'll Twine 'Mid the Ringlets" (1860),

Words by Maud Irving

If the aronatus was a flower, the name itself was not one that survived to our day. It apparently cannot be found in any botanical Index of flower names. It may have been an unofficial appellation local to the author of the lyrics rather than an official botanical name, perhaps coined by someone with a knowledge of Latin. The word's derivation might be, for example, from the Latin (aro = plow, till, produce by plowing; natus = spring forth, grow; be born), in which case the aronatus may have been a wildflower with white petals and a bright blue center that could often be found growing from recently tilled (plowed) earth.

However, all this is conjecture. Another, and perhaps more likely possibility, is that the word aronatus might be a mondegreen, a mishearing or misremembering of another flower name, perhaps the amaranthus.