Bonsai is a word that originates from the Japanese language and that term is given to the trees planted in a pot that, through millenary techniques is achieved that have a small size.
This tree is part of an art that consists of reducing the size of any species or type of plant or tree through pruning, wiring, clamping, among others. Bonsai is the result of different disciplines together like art, philosophy, botany and technique to recreate nature.
Bonsai as a symbol
The art of bonsai comes from an ancient horticultural custom of ancient China that, for hundreds of years was developed and evolving under the influence of Japanese Buddhism to the present. Bonsai is considered as a symbol of eternity.
In China the origin dates back more than 2,300 years where the trees that were cultivated did not reach their natural development due to the environmental conditions, the land, the irrigation or the type of soil. The imperial gardeners were dedicated to replant these trees to recreate a landscape in miniature that served as decoration, however, this technique was reserved for the nobility, but from the sixteenth century became widespread.
Around the world
In Japan this technique came not before the twelfth century and reached great development as they were able to make specimens only 5cm high and a century old; this technique managed to evolve in such a way that forests were created with hundreds of species of bonsai. The bonsai at that time connoted a mystical feeling, providing peace and meditation, it was a way of life and art alien to materialism and bordering on divinity.
The bonsai arrived in Europe, America and Australia in the twentieth century, but did not have as much interest as currently usually has it, now it is a symbol of distinction and knowledge.
