THE cornflower deserves greater regard than it usually receives. A native of the Old World, at least since the Iron Age, it was valued down the centuries. In pharaonic Egypt, it symbolized resurrection and the belief that deceased potentates would return seasonally as the fertility god Osiris to sprout with the next corn crop; a garland of cornflowers around the neck of the mummified Tutankhamun had lost little of its hue in 3,000 years.
Ancient Greece recognized its medicinal value, attributing this discovery to Chiron: the mythological centaur used cornflowers to heal wounds caused by arrows, the tips of which had been dipped in the venomous blood of the Hydra. This Classical link led to the plant's 18th-century genus classification as Centaurea; its species designation is C. cyanus, the Greek for dark blue.
The plant's beneficial qualities were perceived in England by 12th-century monks, who brewed cornflower wine for coughs and colds, to treat kidney complaints, to counteract vertigo, and to function as an antibiotic, diuretic, purgative and astringent. Medieval herbalists Gerard and Culpeper acknowledged this tradition by recommending the cornflower for stomach problems.
These old ways were not without substance. Botanical science has identified an assemblage of flavonoids, ascorbic acids, quercetin, apigenin, and caffeine. It was also understood that the plant benefited eyesight-to sharpen their night vision, Second World War pilots were given bilberry jam, which contains similar beneficial phenolic compounds.
Bu hikaye Country Life UK dergisinin July 20, 2022 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Giriş Yap
Bu hikaye Country Life UK dergisinin July 20, 2022 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Giriş Yap
Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.