An nì a thig leis a’ghaoith falbhaidh e leis an uisge.
What comes with the wind will go with the water.
~From The Dindshenchas
Botanical name: Calluna vulgaris
Family: Ericaceae
Ogham: Ur
Scots Gaelic: Froeach
Irish Gaelic: Froach
Welsh: Grug
French: Bruyère
Message: Learn acceptance. You cannot control all things that will come to pass. You can control how you will react to them.
An t-ór fe’n aiteann, an t-airgead fe’n luachair agus an gortafe’n bhfraoch.
Gold under furze, silver under rushes and famine under heather. (1)
This saying is still popular in County Kerry today, a poetic way to remember that soil bearing many heather plants will not be good. Heather promises hardship to the landholder. The scent of heather is the scent of damp earth and cold. It was described in the Auraicept na n-Éces as silad clann, ‘clay of the Earth’ and uaraib adbaib, ‘the cold dwellings’. (2)
There are few sounds so evocative of barrenness as the rustle of a cold wind through the heather on the hill. It is the plant of grinding poverty and want.
And yet . . .
And yet the cold clay is where seeds sprout. It is white heather which blesses a bride with luck. It is the plant used as the badge of the proud mountain folk who hold their heads high. Few people would choose cold, wet and rocky land among the heather as their homes, but in these cold places of heather and rock, some of the greatest music and the strongest people in the British Isles grew to be great. They still thrive there today.
In past times, young heather shoots made the finest of beds, and their scent encouraged restful sleep. (3) Full of phenolic compounds, the plant also ensured a pest-free bedroom when used to make beds, brooms and scents for the home. (4) Tough as the Highland people themselves, heather stems were used in making farming tools and ropes as well. Heather is the earliest food of the year for wild deer and domestic sheep, green even when the snow lays on it in the highlands of Scotland, Yorkshire, and Northern Ireland. (5)
The plant was seen as valuable enough to be merited a position as one of the ‘bushes of the wood’ in the Brehon law, and clearing a field of it unlawfully earned the fine of a yearling heifer. (6)
It seems that what you see in the heather depends very much on what is within you. A tale from Munster tells us that to this day the grouse bird has been bemoaning its heathery lot in life for generations. Legend says its call is a complaint about High King Caoimh Duath, who decided the allotted nesting places for all birds in Ireland and Scotland. The grouse was given the heather of the hills, and today her descendants still cry:
Ó Caoimh, Ó Caoimh, Ó Caoimh cómhachtac!
Thug a’choill, thug a choill, thug a’ choill dóibhsean,
agus an sliabh domhsa!
– Ó Caoimh, Ó Caoimh, Ó Caoimh, so strong!
You gave the wood, the wood, the wood to them!
You gave the heather to me! (7)
But resentment and suffering are not the only choice for those who endure hardship. It’s said that in the 3rd century A.D., a daughter was born to the great poet Ossian. She was named Malvina, and she grew like a flower, slim and white as a swan. In the fullness of time she was to be married to her true love, Oscar the battle leader. But Oscar did his duty and went to battle for his king. He never came home. A messenger was sent to deliver the news. The messenger brought to the girl a spray of purple heather, much deeper in hue than most.
“He bled upon it as he died,” the messenger said in sorrow, “and he asked us to bring it to you. His heart’s blood was always yours.”
Malvina bowed her head and wept. As she cried, her tears washed the blood away, and with it, the color of the flowers.
Now Malvina had a touch of her father’s magic. Seeing the flowers, she summoned what she could muster, and planted the sprig in the earth.
“There’s been blood and tears shed on you already. Let those who bear white heather have neither bloodshed nor tears as their lot.”
To this day, the carrying of white heather is a protection against the pains of the world. (8)
Heather, especially the white, is often worked into bridal bouquets. Even better for ending the pains of the world was making heather wine or heather-honey mead, said to make all hearts lighter. (8) Before the days of sugar cane, honey was the great sweetener of life, and hives that had been feeding on heather were among the most prized. Entire law tracts were devoted to these hives and how they should be cared for in Ireland and Scotland. (9)
When we see a field of heather, we look into a mirror.
Some of us will see poverty.
Some of us will see rocky ground and moan in despair.
Some will see the beauty of the purple blooms.
Others will listen to the buzzing of the bees and smile.
We may not always choose where we are standing. But what we see there is our choice.
- Ireland’s Wild Plants – Myths, Legends & Folklore, Mac Coitir, Niall, the Collins Press, 2010
- Auraicept na n-éces : the scholars’ primer; being the texts of the Ogham tract from the Book of Ballymote and the Yellow book of Lecan, and the text of the Trefhocul from the Book of Leinster, Calder, George, 1859-1941; Virgilius Maro, Grammaticus, 7th cent; Isidore, of Seville, Saint, d. 636. Published 1917, Public domain
- A Druid’s Herbal of Sacred Tree Medicine, Hopman, Ellen, Destiny Books, 1994
- Webb’s An Irish Flora, Parnell, P. and Curtis, T., Cork University Press ISBN 978-185918-4783, 2012
- Alice M. Coats, British Shrubs and Their Histories, London Press, 1964
- The Brehon Laws: A Legal Handbook, Ginnell, Laurence, 1894
- A Tour in Scotland and Voyage to the Hebrides (1772), Pennant, Thomas, New Ed. Birlinn Ltd, 1998
- Nature in Ireland: A Scientific and Cultural History, Wilson Foster, John, Chesney, Helena C. G., McGill-Queen’s Press, 1998
- A Social History of Ancient Ireland: Treating of the Government, Military System, and Law; Religion, Learning, and Art; Trades, Industries, and Commerce; Manners, Customs, and Domestic Life, of the Ancient Irish People, Volume 2, Joyce, Patrick Weston, Longmans, Green, and Company, 1903