About the name
Name. 'Soleil d'Or' = 'Golden Sun'. For its unprecedented, vivid yellow colour at the time. A poetic French name that conveys the sensational character of the variety. Synonym 'Goldsonne' (German).
Breeding. A revolutionary story. Bred by Joseph Pernet-Ducher (1859–1928, 'the Lyon wizard') at Pernet-Ducher (Lyon, France). For more than 20 years Pernet-Ducher crossed Hybrid Perpetuals with R. foetida (Persian Yellow) and obtained a single seedling, which flowered yellow. Flowering took place around 1885. Parentage: seedling 'Antoine Ducher' (HP) × R. foetida persiana. Official introduction on 1 November 1900 (some sources cite 1898 as the year of the first showing).
Significance. The FIRST Pernetiana, the ancestor of the whole subclass of roses. THE MOTHER OF ALL YELLOW ROSES: without Soleil d'Or there would be no modern yellow, orange or apricot roses — neither Peace (Gloria Dei), nor Mister Lincoln (the red one carries its genes), nor Just Joey, nor thousands of others. Pernetiana as a separate class officially existed until 1930, after which it was absorbed into the Hybrid Tea. Modern yellow rose breeding (Kordes, Meilland, Austin) descends directly, genetically, from this bush. 'Hereditary disease': along with the yellow colour, it passed on to all its descendants a weak resistance to black spot — still a problem in modern breeding. An exceptional historical sacrifice for the breakthrough in colour; without it, twentieth-century breeding would have been impossible. NOT in the WFRS Old Rose Hall of Fame (a common myth): the Old Rose HoF list contains only 5 varieties — Cécile Brünner, Gloire de Dijon, Gruss an Teplitz, Old Blush and Souvenir de la Malmaison. Soleil d'Or is genetically extremely important, but formally it is not inducted into the HoF.