A Prickly Customer

Behind all the thistle’s nasty prickles lies a lot of history and not a little benefit

- Ian Morton

VIKING marauders who landed on the Firth of Clyde beach on the night of October 2, 1263, are said to have had an unpleasant encounter with thistles. Versions vary, but one suggests that the thistles had been strewn defensively on the sand, another that the Norsemen were approaching in barefoot silence to surprise the Scottish encampment and walked into a thistle patch. in either case, their curses and yelps of pain alerted the clansmen, who rose and drove them back to their ships.

This Battle of Largs marked the beginning of the end of the Norse occupation of the Western Isles and the eventual removal of Norwegian influence in Scotland. Furthermore, the legendary part played by the thistle established it as a robust emblem of a traditionally prickly people. They chose the statuesque cotton thistle (Onopordum acanthium), whose spiny silvery foliage topped with a mauve mop can rise to 10ft.

Botanists suggest that this variety may not have then been present in the region and offer the crouching, but equally fierce, spear or bull thistle (right, Cirsium vulgare), a spectacular species that suited a national role. it appeared on Scottish coinage in 1470 and attained ceremonial status in 1540, with the creation by James V of the Order of the Thistle, at its centre the motto of the Royal Stuart dynasty, Nemo me impune laces sit— no one attacks me with impunity—or Wha Daur meddle wi me? in vernacular. Scottish regiments sport both emblem and Latin motto, as definitive as tartan.

Coincidentally, the thistle became the symbol of the city of Nancy in north-eastern France after Lorraine defeated Burgundy in 1477. A thistle portrayed with roots was incorporated with the region’s distinctive cross and this too acquired a threatening motto, Qui s’y frotte s’y pique—whoever touches me will be pricked.