That is interesting. Maybe it is athelas, left by a wandering elf
And i think you may be right, and Tolkien was influenced by a real plant!
Thanks for sharing that, it's intriguing
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| Plant reference reminiscent of Athelas http://www.arwen-undomiel.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=11873 |
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| Author: | Nienor [ October 22nd, 2006, 3:39 pm ] |
| Post subject: | Plant reference reminiscent of Athelas |
I was reading a back issue of an herbal magazine this afternoon, with a cup of hot St. John's Wort tea in front of me (the best way to do reading of any kind), and I came across an interesting article. It was a feature on "Dead Nettle", which, I suppose, doesn't sound all that interesting. But when I reached the section on medicinal uses, I found something intriguing- "In England in the Middle Ages, a poultice of dead nettle was used to treat the King's Evil (scrofula- tuberculosis of the lymph glands), thought to be cured otherwise only by a king's touch." That reminds me a lot of Athelas- common name kingsfoil. I assume that Athelas, the (Elvish?) scientific name of the plant, is comparable to Lamium, the latin name of dead nettle. You can also draw parallels between the histories of each. The name kingsfoil is thought by a few to be potent in the hands of the king, while most regard this as an old wives' tale. Perhaps dead nettle's history stems from a story in which a king was involved in healing of some sort (likely natural healing attributed to said king by superstition, but hey). Further down on the page, the article notes, "A distallae of the flowers was said to 'make the heart merry.'" This reminds me a bit of the results Athelas showed when pitted against the Black Breath. The magazine does note that dead nettle contains tannin, which makes it very bitter. But I don't recall that Tolkien actually mentions the taste of kingsfoil. Maybe it also contains tannins. At any rate, I found this interesting and wanted to share. Perhaps Tolkien was influenced by a real herb when he came up with Athelas. |
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| Author: | Darrell [ October 23rd, 2006, 6:09 am ] |
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That is interesting. Maybe it is athelas, left by a wandering elf And i think you may be right, and Tolkien was influenced by a real plant!
Thanks for sharing that, it's intriguing
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| Author: | Luthien of Lorien [ October 23rd, 2006, 6:36 pm ] |
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That is an interesting thought, Nie. It does seem like a very Tolkien thing to do isn't it? I mean, he was very influenced by real British things, and athelas seems to appear in the stories more than any other healing plant that I can think of. So i agree, it is more than likely Tolkien was influenced by this plant or a similar one when creating Athelas. |
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| Author: | Ivreniel [ October 23rd, 2006, 6:41 pm ] |
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I found another herb which reminded me of athelas a couple years ago. I used to have it listed on my CoE mini-site (you know, that thing where members can have their own little sites within site rules!) but I closed that down and unfortunately can't remember the name. I'm sure Tolkien would've been influenced by natural history, though. |
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| Author: | The Nightingale [ October 31st, 2006, 7:06 am ] |
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Every day more and more proof of Middle-Earth turns up....  There's a plant in our neighborhood that's almost exactly like symblemyne (forgive my spelling!)
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| Author: | Peredhil Lover [ November 1st, 2006, 6:47 pm ] |
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That's cool I'm gonna have a look at that in one of my mum's plant books! |
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