The Old English Herbals

by Eleanour Sinclair Rohde

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:—

“Woods ben wide places wast and desolate y^t many trees growe in w^toute fruyte and also few hauyinge fruyte. And those trees whyche ben bareyne and beereth noo manere fruyte alwaye ben generally more and hygher than̄e y^t wyth fruyte, fewe out taken as Oke and Beche. In thyse wodes ben ofte wylde beestes and foulis. Therein growyth herbes, grasse, lees and pasture, and namely medycynall herbes in wodes foūde. In somer wodes ben bewtyed [beautied] wyth bowes and braunches, w^t herbes and grasse. In wode is place of disceyte [deceit] and of huntynge. For therin wylde beest ben hunted: and watches and disceytes [deceits] ben ordenyd and lette of houndes and of hunters. There is place of hidynge and of lurkyng. For ofte in wodes theuys ben hyd, and oft in their awaytes and disceytes passyng men cometh and ben spoylled and robbed and ofte slayne. And soo for many and dyuerse wayes and uncerten strange men ofte erre and goo out of the waye. And take uncerten waye and the waye that is unknowen before the waye that is knowen and come oft to the place these theues lye in awayte and not wythout peryll. Therefore ben ofte knottes made on trees and in busshes in bowes and in braunches of trees; in token and marke of ye highe waye; to shewe the certen and sure waye to wayefareynge men. But oft theuys in tornynge and metyng of wayes chaunge suche knottes and signes and begyle many men and brynge them out of the ryght waye by false tokens and sygnes. Byrdes, foules and bein [bees] fleeth to wode, byrdes to make nestes and bein [bees] to gadre hony. Byrdes to kepe themself from foulers and bein [bees] to hyde themself to make honycombes preuely in holowe trees and stockes. Also wodes for thyknesse of trees ben colde with shadowe. And in hete of the sonne wery wayfarynge and trauelynge men haue lykynge to have reste and to hele themself in the shadow. Many wodes ben betwyne dyuers coūtrees and londes: and departyth theym asondre. And by weuynge and castyng togyder of trees often men kepeth and defendyth themself from enymies.”[43]

Bartholomew’s book on herbs ends thus: “And here we shall fynysshe and ende in treatyng of the XVII boke whyche hath treated as ye may openly knowe of suche thynges as the Maker of all thyng hath ordered and brought forth by his myghty power to embelyssh and araye the erthe wyth and most specyally for ye fode of man and beast.”

At the end of the book is the poem which has caused so much controversy amongst bibliographers. In this Wynken de Worde definitely states that Caxton had a share in the first printing of this book at Cologne:—

“And also of your charyte call to remembraunce
The soule of William Caxton first prȳter of this boke.
In laten tonge at Coleyn hyself to auauce
That every well disposed man may therein loke.”

In spite of this, modern bibliographers are of opinion that Caxton could not have played even a subordinate part in the printing of this book at Cologne.

De Worde also refers to the maker of the paper[44]:—

“... John Tate the yonger ...
Which late hathe in England doo make this paper thynne
That now in our Englysh this boke is prynted Inne.”

There is charm as well as pathos in the verses on the reproduction of manuscripts in book form, showing us vividly what the recent discovery of the art of printing meant to the scholars of that day. The simile of Phœbus “repairing” the moon is very apt.