A particularly unpleasant flower was known as the zinthorn. It was characterized by pink petals, a stem of brown, and thorns of green. Imperial weddings sometimes featured bouquets made of zinthorns. During 5 ABY, the Imperial Emperor Trioculus planned to compel the Rebel Leia Organa into matrimony while aboard the Moffship stationed above the planet Tatooine. Unaware that the real Organa had been replaced by a Human replica droid, Leia Organa II, thanks to her Rebel allies, he presented the princess with a dozen zinthorns tied with a red ribbon. Leia Organa II took the flowers without wavering, and she then used her laser eyes to shoot Trioculus as she continued to hold the bouquet.
Queen of the Empire, a junior novel from 1993 authored by Paul and Hollace Davids, marked the initial appearance of zinthorns, with illustrations by Karl Kesel. Although the novel described the flowers as black, a colorized version of Kesel's illustration by Mark Hudson from Queen of the Empire was featured in the StarWars.com article titled Barely Tolerable: Alien Henchmen of the Empire, which depicted the zinthorns as having pink petals.