We settle for a spell on a turf bench (planks
laid across sturdy squares of flowering sod). The sheer variety of
plants around us is food for contemplation. To give a flavor of the way
our Shakespearian gardeners mixed and matched, we find rosemary among
the herbs for stews, and again as a flower, and again as a hedge.
Lavender also crossed many paths, being valued as an aromatic, a
medicine and a hedge as well as a flavorant. Violets, considered by the
Celts to be the heralds of spring, were part of the meadow-plot, could
also be made into candy or wine, and contrariwise, as a tea to cure
hangovers. Basil was said to both make scorpions grow – just put some
under a pot for three days and, lo and behold! – and, paradoxically, to
soothe wounds of scorpion bite. Could this be homeopathy at work?
Cabbage was a remedy for tummy ache, and
onions were thought to repel hostile dogs and cure “sudden dumbness.”
Scorpions seem to have been something of an obsession, as even the
common radish was reputed to repel them. Bay leaf protected people from
the devices of Satan, while Angelica Archangelica, used to make
sweets, was perhaps the most powerful nostrum against witchcraft (hence
its potent name). Many plants were hopefully listed as contraindicative
to The Plague, a misguided notion we moderns would have to contradict.
Saffron, a spice and a powerful ochre dye,
could be used as an aphrodisiac and then to ease labor pains – thus
connecting two important aspects of life. Aphrodisiacs were pretty
common, it seems, with cloves, garlic and radishes among the claimants.
A pensée worth considering: why did our European ancestors need
so many aphrodisiacs? And why do we?
The overriding impression we get from our
garden walk is that our great-great-great-greats lived within their
environment, not separate from it. They were not burdened by a barrage
of scientific claims and counter-claims, ads or infomercials. They tried
in their own ways to connect what they saw, smelled and tasted with what
happened in their bodies and minds. They postulated that “as the cause
is, so must the cure be.” They took into consideration the motives of
the heavens and the subterfuge of the devil as they mulled over what
contributes to good mental and physical health. They appreciated the
garden as a microcosm, created ways to enjoy it for its own sake, and
meditated upon its eternal qualities while imbibing its odors and
colors.
They had the happy conviction that coddling
the senses can make us happy. If we are not properly coddled we will
end up needing something from the garden, a symbolic replica of the
first garden, a place of innocence and simple delight. If the cures
proved ineffectual, it was because “God may have other ends best known
to himself.”
It still seems remarkably sound, durable and
workable world view. So as we close the garden gate and return to our
twenty-first century concerns, I gently suggest that you, and I, wake up
and smell the lavender.
