Читать книгу The Old English Herbals - Eleanour Sinclair Rohde - Страница 9

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“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 in the first printed English herbal, commonly known as Banckes’s herbal. Moreover, in this MS. there is recorded an old tradition which I have not found in any other herbal, but which is still current amongst old-fashioned country folk, namely, that rosemary “passeth not commonly in highte the highte of Criste whill he was man on Erthe,” and that when the plant attains the age of thirty-three years it will increase in breadth but not in height. It is the oldest MS. in which we find many other beliefs about rosemary that still survive in England. There is a tradition that Queen Philippa’s mother sent the first plants of rosemary to England, and in a copy of this MS. in the library of Trinity College, Cambridge, the translator, “danyel bain,” says that rosemary was unknown in England until the Countess of Hainault sent some to her daughter.

The only original treatise on herbs written by an Englishman during the Middle Ages was that by Bartholomæus Anglicus, and on the plant-lover there are probably few of the mediæval writers who exercise so potent a spell. Even in the thirteenth century, that age of great men, Bartholomew the Englishman ranked with thinkers such as Roger Bacon, Thomas Aquinas and Albertus Magnus. He was accounted one of the greatest theologians of his day, and if his lectures on theology were as simple as his writings on herbs, it is easy to understand why they were thronged and why his writings were so eagerly studied, not only in his lifetime but for nearly three centuries afterwards. A child could understand his book on herbs, for, being great, he was simple. But although his work De Proprietatibus Rerum (which contains nineteen books) was the source of common information on Natural History throughout the Middle Ages, and was one of the books hired out at a regulated price by the scholars of Paris, we know very little of the writer. He spent the greater part of his life in France and Saxony, but he was English born and was always known as Bartholomæus Anglicus.[39] We know that he studied in Paris and entered the French province of the Minorite Order, and later he became one of the most renowned professors of theology in Paris. In 1230 a letter was received from the general of the Friars Minor in the new province of Saxony asking the provincial of France to send Bartholomew and another Englishman to help in the work of that province, and the former subsequently went there. We do not know the exact date of De Proprietatibus Rerum, but it must have been written about the middle of the thirteenth century; for, though it cites Albertus Magnus, who was teaching in Paris in 1248, there is no mention of any of the later authorities, such as Thomas Aquinas, Roger Bacon and Vincent de Beauvais. It was certainly known in England as early as 1296, for there is a copy of that date at Oxford, and there still exist both in France and in England a considerable number of other manuscript copies, most of which date from the latter part of the thirteenth century and the early part of the fourteenth. The book was translated into English in 1398 by John de Trevisa,[40] chaplain to Lord Berkeley and vicar of Berkeley, and Bartholomew could scarcely have been more fortunate in his translator. At the end of his translation, Trevisa writes thus:—

“Endlesse grace blysse thankyng and praysyng unto our Lorde God Omnipotent be gyuen, by whoos ayde and helpe this translacon was endyd at Berkeleye the syxte daye of Feuerer the yere of our Lorde MCCCLXXXXVIII the yere of y^e reyne of Kynge Rycharde the seconde after the Conqueste of Englonde XXII. The yere of my lordes aege, syre Thomas, Lorde of Berkeleye that made me to make this Translacōn XLVII.”

Salimbene shows that the book was known in Italy in 1283, and there are two MS. copies in the Bibliothèque Nationale of Paris, of which the earliest is dated 1297. Before Trevisa made his English translation, it had been translated into French by Jehan Corbichon, in 1372, for Charles V. of France.

The book was first printed at Basle about 1470, and the esteem in which it was held may be judged from the fact that it went through at least fourteen editions before 1500, and besides the English and French translations it was also translated into Spanish and Dutch. The English translation was first printed by Caxton’s famous apprentice, Wynken de Worde.[41] The translator in a naïve little introductory poem says that, just as he had looked as a child to God to help him in his games, so now he prays Him to help him in this book.

“C[?]Rosse was made all of red .

In the begynning of my boke .

That is called, god me sped .

In the fyrste lesson that j toke .

Thenne I learned a and b .

And other letters by her names .

But alway God spede me .

Thought me nedefull in all games .

Yf I played in felde, other medes .

Stylle other wyth noyse .

I prayed help in all my dedes .

Of him that deyed upon the croys .

Now dyuerse playes in his name .

I shall lette passe forth and far .

And aventure to play so long game .

Also I shall spare .

Wodes, medes and feldes .

Place that I have played inne .

And in his name that all thīg weldes .

This game j shall begynne. .

And praye helpe conseyle and rede .

To me that he wolde sende .

And this game rule and lede .

And brynge it to a good ende. .”

And in the preface Trevisa addresses his readers thus: “Merveyle not, ye witty and eloquent reders, that I thȳne of wytte and voyde of cunning have translatid this boke from latin to our vulgayre language as a thynge profitable to me and peradventure to many other, whych understonde not latyn nor have not the knowledge of the proprytees of thynges.”

The seventeenth book of De Proprietatibus Rerum is on herbs and their uses, and it is full of allusions to the classical writers on herbs—Aristotle, Dioscorides and Galen—but the descriptions of the plants themselves are original and charming.

There is no record to show that Bartholomew the Englishman was a gardener, but we can hardly doubt that the man who described flowers with such loving care possessed a garden and worked in it. The Herbarius zu Teutsch might have been written in a study, but there is fresh air and the beauty of the living flowers in Bartholomew’s writings. Of the lily he says: “The Lely is an herbe wyth a whyte floure. And though the levys of the floure be whyte yet wythen shyneth the lyknesse of golde.” Bartholomew may have known nothing of the modern science of botany, but he knew how to describe not only the lily, but also the atmosphere of the lily, in a word-picture of inimitable simplicity and beauty. One feels instinctively that only a child or a great man could have written those lines. And is there not something unforgettable in these few words on the unfolding of a rose—“And whāne they [the petals] ben full growen they sprede theymselues ayenst the sonne rysynge”?

The chapter on the rose is longer than most, and is so delightful that I quote a considerable part of it. “The rose of gardens is planted and sette and tylthed as a vyne. And if it is forgendred and not shred and pared and not clensed of superfluyte: thēne it gooth out of kynde and chaungeth in to a wylde rose. And by oft chaunging and tylthing the wylde rose torneth and chaūgith into a very rose. And the rose of ye garden and the wylde rose ben dyuers in multitude of floures: smelle and colour: and also in vertue. For the leves of the wylde rose ben fewe and brode and whytyssh: meddlyd wyth lytyll rednesse: and smellyth not so wel as the tame rose, nother is so vertuous in medicyn. The tame rose hath many leuys sette nye togyder: and ben all red, other almost white: w^t wonder good smell. … And the more they ben brused and broken: the vertuoūser they ben and the better smellynge. And springeth out of a thorne that is harde and rough: netheles the Rose folowyth not the kynde of the thorne: But she arayeth her thorn wyth fayr colour and good smell. Whan ye rose begynneth to sprynge it is closed in a knoppe wyth grenes: and that knoppe is grene. And whan̄e it swellyth thenne spryngeth out harde leuys and sharpe. … And whāne they ben full growen they sprede theymselues ayenst the sonne rysynge. And for they ben tendre and feble to holde togyder in the begynnynge; theyfore about those smale grene leuys ben nyghe the red and tendre leuys … and ben sette all aboute. And in the mydill thereof is seen the sede small and yellow wyth full gode smell.”

WOODCUT OF TREES AND HERBS FROM THE SEVENTEENTH BOOK OF “DE PROPRIETATIBUS RERUM”

Printed by Wynkyn de Worde (1495)

There follows a description, too long to quote here, of the growth of the rose hip, which ends with the remark: “But they ben not ful good to ete for roughnesse that is hyd wythin. And greuyth [grieveth] wythin his throte that ete thereof.” … “Among all floures of the worlde,” he continues, “the floure of the rose is cheyf and beeryth ye pryse. And by cause of vertues and swete smelle and savour. For by fayrnesse they fede the syghte: and playseth the smelle by odour, the touche by softe handlynge. And wythstondeth and socouryth by vertue ayenst many syknesses and euylles.” A delicious recipe is given for Rose honey. “Rose shreede smalle and sod in hony makyth that hony medycynable wyth gode smelle: And this comfortyeth and clenseth and defyeth gleymy humours.”

Of the violet we read: “Violet is a lytyll herbe in substaunce and is better fresshe and newe than whan it is olde. And the floure thereof smellyth moost. … And the more vertuous the floure thereof is, ye more it bendyth the heed thereof doūwarde. Also floures of spryngynge tyme spryngeth fyrste and sheweth somer. The lytylnes thereof in substaunce is nobly rewarded in gretnesse of sauour and of vertue.”

Bartholomew’s descriptions of flowers are usually brief, and there is a clarity and vividness about them which give them a charm peculiarly their own. How fresh and English, for instance, is his chapter on the apple. I have never before seen the taste of an apple described as “merry,” but how true the description is! “Malus the Appyll tree is a tree yt bereth apples and is a grete tree in itself … it is more short than other trees of the wood wyth knottes and rinelyd Rynde. And makyth shadowe wythe thycke bowes and braunches: and fayr with dyuers blossomes, and floures of swetnesse and lykynge: with goode fruyte and noble. And is gracious in syght and in taste and vertuous in medecyne … some beryth sourysh fruyte and harde and some ryght soure and some ryght swete, with a good savoure and mery.” The descriptions of celandine and broom are also characteristic. “Celidonia is an herbe w^t yelowe floures, the frute smorcheth them that it towchyth. And hyghte Celidonia for it spryngeth, other blomyth, in the comynge of swalowes. … It hyȝt celidonia for it helpith swallowes birdes yf their eyen be hurte other (or) blynde.” “Genesta hath that name of bytterness for it is full of bytter to mannes taste. And is a shrubbe that growyth in a place that is forsaken, stony and untylthed. Presence thereof is wytnesse that the grounde is bareyne and drye that it groweth in. And hath many braunches knotty and hard. Grene in wynter and yelowe floures in somer thyche [the which] wrapped with heuy smell and bitter sauour. And ben netheles moost of vertue.” Bartholomew gives the old mandrake legend in full, though he adds, “it is so feynd of churles others of wytches,” and he also writes of its use as an anæsthetic.[42] Further, he records two other beliefs about the mandrake which I have never found in any other English herbal—namely, that while uprooting it one must beware of contrary winds, and that one must go on digging for it until sunset. “They that dygge mandragora be besy to beware of contrary wyndes whyle they digge. And maken circles abowte with a swerder and abyde with the dyggynge unto the sonne goynge downe.”

But apart from herbs and their uses, the book De herbis is full of fleeting yet vigorous pictures of the homely everyday side of mediæval life. Bartholomew, being one of the greatest men of his century, writes of matters in which the simplest of us are interested. He tells us of the feeding of swine with acorns. Of the making and baking of bread (including the thrifty custom of mixing cooked beans with the flour “to make the brede the more hevy”). Incidentally, and with all due respect, it may be remarked that he had no practical knowledge of this subject, his vivid description being obviously that of an interested spectator. There is an airy masculine vagueness about the conclusion of the whole matter of bread-making—“and at last after many travailes, man’s lyfe is fedde and sustained therewith.” He tells us of the use of laurel leaves to heal bee and wasp stings and to keep books and clothes from “moths and other worms,” of the making of “fayre images” and of boxes wherein to keep “spycery” from the wood of the box-tree. Of the making of trestle tables “areared and set upon feet,” of playing boards “that men playe on at the dyes [dice] and other gamys. And this maner of table is double and arrayd wyth dyerse colours.” Of the making of writing tables, of wood used for flooring that “set in solar floors serue all men and bestys y^t ben therein, and ben treden of alle men and beestys that come therein,” and so strong that “they bende not nor croke [crack] whan they ben pressyd w^t heuy thynges layd on them.” And also of boards used for ships, bridges, hulks and coffers, and “in shypbreche [shipwreck] men fle to bordes and ben ofte sauyd in peryll.” Of the building of houses with roofs of “trees stretchyd from the walles up to the toppe of ye house,” with rafters “stronge and square and hewen playne,” and of “the covering of strawe and thetche [thatch].” Of the making of linen from the soaking of the flax in water till it is dried and turned in the sun and then bound in “praty bundels” and “afterward knockyd, beten and brayd and carflyd, rodded and gnodded; ribbyd and heklyd and at the laste sponne,” of the bleaching, and finally of its many uses for making clothing, and for sails, and fish nets, and thread, and ropes, and strings (“for bows”), and measuring lines, and sheets (“to reste in”), and sackes, and bagges, and purses (“to put and to kepe thynges in”). Of the making of tow “uneven and full of knobs,” used for stuffing into the cracks in ships, and “for bonds and byndynges and matches for candelles, for it is full drye and takyth sone fyre and brenneth.” “And so,” he concludes somewhat breathlessly, “none herbe is so nedefull to so many dyurrse uses to mankynde as is the flexe.” Of the vineyard “closyd about wyth walles and wyth hegges, with a wayte [watch] set in an hyghe place to kepe the vynyerde that the fruyte be not dystroyed.” Of the desolation of the vineyard in winter, “but in harueste tyme many comyth and haunteth the vynyerde.” Of the delicious smell of a vineyard. Of the damage done by foxes and swine and “tame hounds.” “A few hounds,” Bartholomew tells us, “wasten and dystroye moo grapes that cometh and eteth therof theuylly [thievishly].” “A vineyard,” he concludes, “maye not be kepte nother sauyd but by his socour and helpe that all thynge hath and possesseth in his power and myghte. And kepyth and sauyth all lordly and myghtily.” And is there any other writer who in so few words tells us of the woods in those days? Of the “beestis and foulis” therein as well as the herbs, of the woods in summer-time, of the hunting therein, of the robbers and the difficulty of finding one’s way? Of the birds and the bees and the wild honey and the delicious coolness of the deep shade in summer, and the “wery wayfarynge trauelynge men”? And the final brief suggestion of the time when forests were veritable boundaries? I believe also that this is the only book in which we are told of the interesting old custom of tying knots to the trees “in token and marke of ye highe waye,” and of robbers deliberately removing them. The picture is so perfect that I give it in full:—