The secret history of flowers

With no written records, the earliest inhabitants of these isles left a living dossier of cultural history in the folklore attached to our wildflowers

- John Lewis-Stempel

WHAT’S in a name? If that name is the old cognomen of a British wildflower, then it is the epigraph of the lore concerning the plant, the superstitions, traditions and knowledge linked to it over decades, centuries, millennia. Our wildflowers are deeply rooted in ancient myth and experience, their naming and their lore telling of their qualities —whether good or bad for human health, for example—but also, when we dig a little deeper, reflecting our own cultural history.

Pick a buttercup and play the childish game of holding it under someone’s chin to see the yellow sheen that betrays whether they like butter or not and you are enacting a relic belief of the West Country. There, long, long ago, farmers rubbed the udders of their cows with buttercup flowers on May Day, to increase the yield and richness of their milk. The ritual rubbing also protected the cattle from theft by faeries, who were always desirous of improving their herds of fairy cattle by interbreeding with cows from mortal fields.

The lore of the plants is a window into the mind of the past, even the far past, when spirits, elves and even the Devil were abroad. To cut foxgloves—or ‘fairy bells’ or ‘witches thimble’—for the prettification of the home was an offence against the fae people who lived in the flowers, inviting death. Conversely, for diabolical animals such as the fox, the bell-shaped flower, put on the paws, allowed it to prey on poultry in sorcerous silence.

Many of the earliest inhabitants of these isles, those of druid time, had no writing, left no record on stone or paper, but floral folklore is their memorial. To know the stories and legends of the wildflowers connects us with our forebears, but also with the plants, in a manner more profound today than merely studying their botany—or using their Latin, scientific names, which are invariably prosaic, based on the flora’s physical appearance.