In literature, ancient and modern, sacred and profane, no flower figures so conspicuously as the rose. To the Romans it was most significant when placed over the door of a public or private banquet hall. Each who passed beneath it bound himself thereby not to disclose anything said or done within; hence the expression sub rosa, common to this day. ^{Netje Blanchan Wild Flowers worth Knowing(1917)}

The rose plays a prominent role in Greek and Roman mythology, Homer's allusions to it in the Iliad and Odyssey are the earliest records, and Sappho, the Greek poetess, writing in about 600 B.C., crowned the Rose Queen of Flowers.

Roses were grown in monastery gardens in the Middle Ages in Europe and used by the monks for medicinal purposes. The French have been distilling roses since before the French revolution, these early French ottos were a byproduct of the distillation process. ^{Grieve, M.,684}

It was between 1582 and 1612 that the oil or OTTO OF ROSES was discovered, as recorded in two separate histories of the Grand Moguls. At the wedding feast of the princess Nour-Djihan with the Emperor Djihanguyr, son of Akbar, a canal circling the whole gardens was dug and filled with rose-water. The heat of the sun separating the water from the essential oil of the Rose, was observed by the bridal pair when rowing on the fragrant water. It was skimmed off and found to be an exquisite perfume. The discovery was immediately turned to account and the manufacture of Otto of Roses was commenced in Persia about 1612 and long before the end of the seventeenth century the distilleries of Shiraz were working on a large scale. The first mention of Persian Otto or Attar of Roses is by Kampfer (1683), who alludes to the export to India.