The Old English Herbals. Eleanour Sinclair Rohde
target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="#ulink_eb8b6755-fba8-5ed5-ab21-ee5ca21e531b">[32] Lacnunga, 9.
[33] This closely resembles a Cornish charm for a tetter.
“Tetter, tetter, thou hast nine brothers,
God bless the flesh and preserve the bone;
Perish thou, tetter, and be thou gone.
Tetter, tetter, thou hast eight brothers.”
Thus the verses are continued until tetter having “no brother” is ordered to be gone.—R. Hunt, Popular Romances of the West of England, p. 414.
[34] For further instances of the mystic use of three and nine see also Leech Book, I. 45, 47, 67.
[35] St. Eloy, in a sermon preached in A.D. 640, also forbade the enchanting of herbs:—
“Before all things I declare and testify to you that you shall observe none of the impious customs of the pagans, neither sorcerers, nor diviners, nor soothsayers, nor enchanters, nor must you presume for any cause to enquire of them. … Let none regulate the beginning of any piece of work by the day or by the moon. Let none trust in nor presume to invoke the names of dæmons, neither Neptune, nor Orcus, nor Diana, nor Minerva, nor Geniscus nor any other such follies. … Let no Christian place lights at the temples or the stones, or at fountains, or at trees, or at places where three ways meet. … Let none presume to hang amulets on the neck of man or beast. … Let no one presume to make lustrations, nor to enchant herbs, nor to make flocks pass through a hollow tree, or an aperture in the earth; for by so doing he seems to consecrate them to the devil. Let none on the kalends of January join in the wicked and ridiculous things, the dressing like old women or like stags, nor make feasts lasting all night, nor keep up the custom of gifts and intemperate drinking. Let no one on the festival of St. John or on any of the festivals join in the solstitia or dances or leaping or caraulas or diabolical songs.”—From a sermon preached by St. Eloy in A.D. 640.
[36] A Christian prayer for a blessing on herbs runs thus:—
“Omnipotens sempiterne deus qui ab initio mundi omnia instituisti et creasti tam arborum generibus quam herbarum seminibus quibus etiam benedictione tua benedicendo sanxisti eadem nunc benedictione olera aliosque fructus sanctificare ac benedicere digneris ut sumentibus ex eis sanitatem conferant mentis et corporis ac tutelam defensionis eternamque uitam per saluatorem animarum dominum nostrum iesum christum qui uiuit et regnat dominus in secula seculorum. Amen.”
[37] Translation from Early English Magic and Medicine by Dr. Charles Singer. Proceedings of the British Academy, Vol. IV.
CHAPTER II
LATER MANUSCRIPT HERBALS AND THE EARLY PRINTED HERBALS
“Spryngynge tyme is the time of gladnesse and of love; for in Sprynging time all thynge semeth gladde; for the erthe wexeth grene, trees burgynne [burgeon] and sprede, medowes bring forth flowers, heven shyneth, the see resteth and is quyete, foules synge and make theyr nestes, and al thynge that semed deed in wynter and widdered, ben renewed, in Spryngyng time.”—Bartholomæus Anglicus, circ. 1260.
Between the Anglo-Saxon herbals and the early printed herbals there is a great gulf. After the Norman Conquest the old Anglo-Saxon lore naturally fell into disrepute, although the Normans were inferior to the Saxons in their knowledge of herbs. The learned books of the conquerors were written exclusively in Latin, and it is sad to think of the number of beautiful Saxon books which must have been destroyed, for when the Saxons were turned out of their own monasteries the Normans who supplanted them probably regarded books written in a language they did not understand as mere rubbish. Much of the old Saxon herb lore is to be found in the leech books of the Middle Ages, but, with one notable exception, no important original treatise on herbs by an English writer has come down to us from that period. The vast majority of the herbal MSS. are merely transcriptions of Macer’s herbal, a mediæval Latin poem on the virtues of seventy-seven plants, which is believed to have been written in the tenth century. The popularity of this poem is shown by the number of MSS. still extant. It was translated into English as early as the twelfth century with the addition of “A fewe herbes wyche Macer tretyth not.”[38] In 1373 it was translated by John Lelamoure, a schoolmaster of Hertford. On folio 55 of the MS. of this translation is the inscription, “God gracious of grauntis havythe yyeue and ygrauted vertuys in woodys stonys and herbes of the whiche erbis Macer the philosofure made a boke in Latyne the whiche boke Johannes Lelamoure scolemaistre of Herforde est, they he unworthy was in the yere of oure Lorde a. m. ccc. lxxiij tournyd in to Ynglis.” Macer’s herbal is also the basis of a treatise in rhyme of which there are several copies in England and one in the Royal Library at Stockholm. This treatise, which deals with twenty-four herbs, begins thus quaintly—
“Of erbs xxiiij I woll you tell by and by
Als I fond wryten in a boke at I in boroyng toke
Of a gret ladys preste of gret name she barest.”
The poem begins with a description of betony, powerful against “wykked sperytis,” and then treats, amongst other herbs, of the virtues of centaury, marigold, celandine, pimpernel, motherwort, vervain, periwinkle, rose, lily, henbane, agrimony, sage, rue, fennel and violet. It is pleasant to find the belief that only to look on marigolds will draw evil humours out of the head and strengthen the eyesight.
“Golde [marigold] is bitter in savour
Fayr and ȝelw [yellow] is his flowur
Ye golde flour is good to sene
It makyth ye syth bryth and clene
Wyscely to lokyn on his flowris
Drawyth owt of ye heed wikked hirores [humours].
… . …
Loke wyscely on golde erly at morwe [morning]
Yat day fro feueres it schall ye borwe:
Ye odour of ye golde is good to smelle.”
The instructions for the picking of this joyous flower are given at length. It must be taken only when the moon is in the sign of the Virgin, and not when Jupiter is in the ascendant, for then the herb loses its virtue. And the gatherer, who must be out of deadly sin, must say three Pater Nosters and three Aves. Amongst its many virtues we find that it gives the wearer a vision of anyone who has robbed him. The virtues of vervain also are many; it must be picked “at Spring of day” in “ye monyth of May.” Periwinkle is given its beautiful old name “joy of the ground” (“men calle it ye Juy of Grownde”) and the description runs thus:—
“Parwynke is an erbe grene of colour
In tyme of May he beryth blo flour,
His stalkys ain [are] so feynt [weak] and feye
Yet never more growyth he heye [high].”
Under sage we find the old proverb—“How can a man die who has sage in his garden?”
“Why of seknesse deyeth man
Whill sawge [sage] in gardeyn he may han.”
A manuscript of exceptional interest is one describing the virtues of rosemary which was sent by the Countess of Hainault to her daughter Philippa, Queen of England, and apart from its intrinsic interest it is important from the fact that it is obviously the original of the very poetical discourse on rosemary