Elder Blossoms

Prairial 17
Elder Tree

My timing couldn’t be better. I went to a work party for my P-Patch garden and was asked to get rid of some cuttings of overgrown plants. One was a delicious smelling flower, with tiny white umbels, that came off a tree overhanging the fence. The flowers smell as sweet as white grape juice. I brought it home, stuck it in a vase, and then looked it up and discovered they are elder blossoms.

Then I looked at the French Republican Calendar for Prairial 17 and discovered the plant of the day is Sureau (Elder Tree). You can convert the Gregorian calendar to the French Republican Calendar and vice versa at this web site: http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/calendar/

Unfortunately, after searching on the web and in my plant books for some time for pictures of elders, I am not at all sure that the flowers in a vase on my desk are elder. In fact, I have no idea what they are so I probably won’t try making a tea out of them. But I’ll write about elder anyway as it’s one of those plants rich with folklore.

Ellen Evert Hopman in her book, Tree Medicine, Tree Magic, writes that she experiences the spirit of the tree as having the energy of the Great Mother. It is an herb of Venus. For centuries, women have washed their face in the dew of elderberry blossoms for beauty. And Elderflower Water was commonly used by women to keep their skin soft and white.

According to Hopman, the Germans and Scandinavians believe in a potent spirit known as Hylde-moer or Elder-Mother who lives in elder trees. Hopman says you must ask permission before cutting an Elder tree, explain why you need the wood and give the spirit time to vacate. She also says that Elder grants even the smallest wish.

The Elder tree is also a tree of protection. Put it over your door to ward off negative energy. Plant it near your home to keep away evil. Elder worn and used as a decoration at handfastings and weddings brings prosperity and luck. And Hopman recommends using Elder Flower water at a child’s blessing. Yet as the Rodale Encyclopedia of Herbs relates, no carpenter would make a cradle of elderwood for fear of bringing harm to the baby. In the Herbal Tarot, Elder is the card of Death, perhaps because it is the last tree in the Celtic tree year.

The elder seems to be associated with the German goddess Holde (or perhaps it's just a confusion of name). But I find it interesting that elder flowers are often baked into pancakes and fritters. Pancakes were a common offering for Frau Holde's twin sister, Perchta, and both of them were said to lead the Wild Horde, which flew through the night sky. They were goddesses of abundance as well as death.

Harold Stephen Buhner, whose writing on the medicinal and spiritual aspects of plants I love, describes how the Kwakiutl use elder root to induce vomiting when a woman is ill and needs to get rid of what is causing her illness. Her husband gets his digging stick and goes and sits in front of an Elder tree and says,

O, Supernatural One, you who are not ordinary, I come to pray to you that you go, please, and make vomit my poor wife that she may vomit the cause which makes her feel qualmish all the time, you, Merciful-One, that you, please make come out the cause of it, Supernatural One.

Then he digs the root and cuts off a length the equal of four fingers and the thickness of one finger. At home yhe pours water into a small dish and washes the dirt from the roots. He pours out the dirty water and puts fresh water into the dish and takes a rough stone, puts it in the dish and rubs the wet roots on it. When the water becomes milky he stops and pours the medicine into a cup to give to his wife. She says a prayer before drinking it, that goes like this:

The-One-Asked-to-heal, Supernatural-One, you have come to take pity on me, you who have the name Healing-Woman, you who have the name Life-Bringer. Please, press out this which causes my qualmishness that I, please, may vomit, please, Supernatural One.

My favorite web site for herbal information has a comprehensive explanation of the history and uses of elder derived from the work of Maud Grieve:
http://botanical.com/botanical/mgmh/e/elder-04.html

My favorite Schnapps-making site has a recipe for Elderberry Schnapps:
http://www.danish-schnapps-recipes.com/elderberry.html

The illustrations come from this website:
http://www.2020site.org/trees/elder.html

References:
Buhner, Stephen Harrod, Sacred Plant Medicine, Roberts Rinehart 1996
Hopman, Ellen Evert, Tree Medicine, Tree Magic, Phoenix Publishing 1991
Murray, Liz and Colin, The Celtic Tree Oracle: A System of Divination, illustrated by Vanessa Card, St Martin’s 1988
Rodale’s Illustrated Encyclopedia of Herbs, edited by Claire Kowalchik and William H. Hylton, 1987
Tierra, Michael, The Herbal Tarot, illustrations by Candis Cantin, Us Games 1988

A Flower a Day

I have no doubt that my Catholic childhood had a lot to do with my becoming a calendar priestess and folklorist specializing in seasonal holidays. From very early on, I learned that there was a sacred rhythm to the year and particular ceremonies to honor it. And I sometimes date the start of my vocation to the day (was it when I was confirmed?) that I was given a Saint of the Day stamp calendar, which I still own in almost-mint condition.

But I didn’t begin actively collecting seasonal holiday folklore until I was a lonely sophomore at Reed College in the early 1970’s, when I spent a lot of time at the library, poring over Chambers Book of Days and Funk and Wagnalls Dictionary of Folklore and Mythology. It was around this time that I discovered the French Republican Calendar. I even wrote a paper about it for my Humanities class.

The French revolutionaries wanted to do away with any vestige of the old regime, including the old political and religious holidays, so they created a new calendar, one that would be eminently rational and practical. Each month was thirty days and contained three weeks of ten days (thereby quite handily abolishing Sundays). The months were named after the seasonal qualities and grouped by season as well.

Spring began on Mar 20/21 (the Spring Equinox) with Germinal (seed), followed by Floreal (flower) and Prairial (meadow). Summer began on June 19/20 (Summer Solstice) with Messidor (harvest) followed by Thermidor (hot) and Fructidor (fruit). Autumn began on Sept 22, 23 or 24 (around the Autumn Equinox) and contained Vendemiaire (vintage), Brumaire (mist) and Frimaire (frost). While Winter began on Dee 21, 22 or 23 with the month named Nivose (snowy), followed by Pluviose (rainy) and Ventose (windy).

The English, who were not big fans of the French at this time, made fun of the new seasons by calling the months Showery, Flowery and Bowery; Wheaty, Heaty and Sweety; Wheezy, Sneezy and Freezy; and Slippy, Drippy and Nippy.

In order to make the calendar match up with the tropical calendar, five extra days were added at the end of every year (so starting on September 17). These were named Virtue Day, Talent Day, Labor Day, Opinion Day, Rewards Day and in leap years an extra day, Revolution Day.

Instead of the old custom of saints days, each day of the year was assigned a quality or a plant. Most days were linked to plants but days ending in 5 were associated with animals and those ending in 0 with tools.

And for many years this is all I knew about the French Republican Calendar. I longed to find a description of the meanings assigned to those days but my searches turned up no further information. Until a few weeks ago when I did a search on Wikipedia and found a great article on the French Republican Calendar which included a chart showing the meanings assigned to each day.
http://en/wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Revolutionary_Calendar

This discovery had two effects upon me, besides the sheer elation. One, I realized that practically everything I want to know will sooner or later surface on the Internet and that I don’t need to do all the research alone. Two, it inspired me to start this blog, in which I will feature, as often as I can, a flower a day, in an effort to find the flowery and seasonal correlations of my days.

I have in my collection a chart that that assigns a flower to every day. Alas, this came from those lonely days at Reed College and I didn’t annotate my source. From time to time, I pull it out and look at it but I’ve never liked the assignments--they don’t make sense to me seasonally. I know that Pip Wilson of Wilson’s Almanac (http://www.wilsonsalmanac.com/) provides a plant for every day of the year, mostly plants associated with a saint of the day. With the addition of the French Republican Calendar list on Wikipedia, I have three choices for any day and I believe I will be able to find something meaningful for each day.

Let me know if you have any suggestions, lists or nominations for flower of a particular day.