Blackthorn. Folklore, Mythology and Symbolism of the Blackthorn Tree (Straif | Thurisaz) 

On the blackthorn spikes on day 2 of the job he presented me with cow hide arm protectors as well as what seemed very odd a piece that strapped over the shoulders and up the neck, if he hadn't been wearing it I would have thought it a joke. The neck part was essential as your layering your folding half cut trees over and the back of the neck is always getting hit by branches. Happy memories of one of the hardest working years of my life Any punctures he would rub a greasy/fatty salve into them, never got infected but they woukd hurt for days afterwards.

Thanks for this comment, that was really interesting and touching, but also for taking a fragment of the old knowledge and passing it forward. I hope you teach others how to hedge lay on occasion, so maybe the skill won’t die. Hedge layers are like storytellers in a way. Passing the old ways on. Thank you 🙏

Sláinte and thanks 🙏

It’s gin all round for Christmas this year 😂

I know… but hey. It will grow back. Sycamores are fighters 🌳

Stray curs and Englishmen. Love that 😂 I’ve been meaning to make myself a nice Shillelagh to bop myself on the head on for a while now 😅 I know, the ones you see for sale are quite dear aren’t they?

Glad you like them, gotta keep the heritage alive, the stories are inside you. Or maybe you’re inside them 😉

That is very apt… Hope you’ve managed to make peace with the shadows of the past Maybe you need to spend some time with birch next. New beginnings ☺️✨ All the best to you and thanks for watching 🙏

@@TheStoryCrow indeed and bless you 💜☀️

Ooooh. I love this Iain, thank you. Got Comfrey growing out of my ears (and other places) here. Heard about Comfrey poultices for broken and bruised bones, but never drawing out toxins - I will definitely be trying that when I next get spiked by Blackthorn 😅 You gotta love the grandmothers wisdom. Thanks for stopping by my friend. Gra.

Thanks for that information, have been looking for a cure for ages, sadly big Internet pharma does not like shared natural info... 🍀👍✊

Interesting information🤔 I've been getting information that comfy heals to fast and seals infection in🤷‍♀️ I'll have to try this. I've been using plantain for its drawing properties on goanna bites on my ataked chickens and its worked well. But that's not specifically the black thorn toxins I guess.

My grandfather from Czechslovkia/Czechia use to make comfrey leaf 🍃 tea for circulation. He drank it daily . Us Slavs always used , roots, herbs 🌿 ect for health reasons and for warding off werewolves and vampires 🧛‍♀️ 😂😅

Glad you like them Nettie, more to come 🌳 😊

Welcome aboard!

Same!❤

☝️

Oooh, I love this. What part of the world may I ask?

Welcome aboard! 🌳 🌳 🌳

It seems a little ridiculous to get a vibe even though it is on the internet. But I get a strong energy from that lass and it's very positive.. like she's got very .. joyful (?) vibes. I know what i'm getting I don't care it sounds corny

Mrs crow 😂 Yeah she’s a good un, I’m a lucky boy. Thanks for watching friend 😊🙏

Oh, I’ll get round to it 🙏😊

I’ve been there. Made a callous years later. Right through the shoe!

@@TheStoryCrow I had something similar about a year after, I thought it was a verruca as first, but it wasn’t, just hard skin, interesting 🤔.

No worries mate ☺️🙏

He does probably have patterdale in him, well spotted! It’s always interesting hearing people wonder what breed he is - proper mongrel from the streets of Romania 😂 Black lab and collie too I think, but lots of terrier for sure. He loves a good dig and a sniff

Thanks, will do. Cheers for the tip 🙏✨🦌

I found this comment quite amusing.

Welcome aboard! 😊🙏

It’s only those two times officer i promise

I reckon Rowan is next on my list 👍🌳☺️

"The Celtic tree calendar" was invented in the 1940s by Robert Graves.

I thank you Sir!

Or Madam

I had not made the connection to the moon in the name of the luantishee. The connection to the rune affiliated with Thurisaz is also remarkable. While it is obviously very questionable how much of this is deliberate (although the druids were allegedly fluent in Greek), that lines up in a fascinating way with Hellenistic astrology. Blackthorn symbolism has some obvious overlap with Samhain/Nos Galan Gaeaf, and as I understand it, archeological and historical evidence indicate that the date was likely a week or two later than the modern date, of which one of the primary suspected rationales is that it corresponds to the solar midpoint, halfway between the autumnal equinox and arboreal solstice. This happens to place the sun in the zodiacal sign of Scorpio, the feminine/nocturnal dominion of Mars, the red and violent classical planet... and the 'fall' of Luna, where the silver one is corrupted and brings out the worst in her. Luna is also debilitated or 'exiled' in Capricorn, the sign of the arboreal solstice (which ties in with Calleach Buer's rule of winter and 'blackthorn winters') and the soul's exit from this world, 'exalted' in Taurus (approximately May), which brings out the best in her, and herself rules Cancer, the sign of the estival solstice and birth and the mother. Jupiter pertains to Thor and, I have speculated for some time, Mjolnir to specifically Jupiter in Cancer (Jupiter's exaltation). While I have been personally looking at blackthorn as a Mars in Cancer (Mars's fall) thing, that is not necessarily off-base; Mars and Luna are each fallen in the other's domicile and both lend themselves well to blackthorn's themes. I wonder if any of that was whatsoever deliberate or integrated into the associated lore, such as either through deliberate synchronism on the part of the Celtic peoples, or through a common Proto-Indo-European lineage? Or perhaps it is an incidental overlap of perceptions and/or archetypes. It is fascinating that it lines up so well, though.

Not sure where I picked up that titbit, but my fingers have learned the hard way many times over 😅

Really interesting you bring this up, and I think about this a lot. Whether there was an older sub culture which fed into various disparate later cultures such as Celtic and Hellenic, entirely plausible. Or maybe some ‘spooky action at a distance’ type phenomena relating to the collective unconscious? 🤔 thanks for this input anyway. Very interesting 🙏☺️

​@@TheStoryCrow I've been trying to understand these ancient British - European connections as well. This is where I've got to, sorry for the length! Check out the amazing book, "The Baltic Origins of Homer's Epic Tales" by Vinci, and also the research work of the fantastic historian Alan Wilson of Ancient Britain. It seems that there was a common Bronze Age North European culture that we now also call 'Hellenic' or 'Achaean' (from Greek legends) or the Beaker People (from archaeology). ie. These were the same as the 'Ancient Greeks', who pre-dated the Classical Greeks by a couple of thousand years (give or take). The Ancient Greek tales and the - possibly even more ancient - astrological knowledge come from northern Europe. Yes, that's right, when you're reading Homer's tales about Troy and the Odyssey, you are reading part of your own Bronze Age past culture, a more sophisticated society than we think. This culture was centred all around the Baltic regions (from Denmark to Finland). The Bronze Ages of c.5000-2000BC were a high point of north Europe culture because this was a period when the climate was warmer in northern Europe (the 'Climatic Optimum'). Some of these Beaker tribes were sailing and trading all across northern Europe, including bringing tin from Britain which seems to have been the main source of tin for north Europe bronze. They were a blond-haired, blue-eyed people, an early 'Viking' culture and presumably the same people as the germanic celtic and nordic people of today. From around 2000BC, the climate began changing and northern Europe started to become colder. This pushed many of these tribes to re-settle elsewhere. The people which earlier settled in southern Britain we now call the Wessex culture, an advanced Bronze Age culture (around 2000BC), slowly replacing the earlier dark-haired 'Cheddar man' people. The battle of Troy took place during these colder times, around 1800BC. After this war, which signified the end of this high Bronze Age era (why this war is important to this day, perhaps especially to the ruling classes), the various tribes that lived around the Baltic Sea migrated away. Some went south to the Mediterranean, taking their 'greek' legends with then, and they later became the Myceneans, and even later the Classical Greeks. They re-named many places around the Mediterranean after the places of their legends, but these were NOT the original locations of the legends. Others went towards India and were the ancient Aryans who brought the basis of the caste system and Hinduism with them. ie. these movements account for the ancient commonality of the Indo-European culture. One group, the Trojans (enemies of the Achaeans/ancient Greeks in the Trojan war), also travelled south and became the early Roman leaders. One of these Trojan tribes eventually sailed to Britain, and founded the Ancient British dynasties of Iron Age kings, which lasted from 1700BC to about 600 AD (in England), and to about 1300AD in Wales. King Arthur about 550AD. You can read this history from their own mouths, by reading the translated "Chronicles of Brut" on-line. They never forgot that they came from Troy, which is why their capital London was initially called New Troy, and why all classically educated students learn of Troy and why we are taught to respect the Romans. This history accounts for the two-tier culture of Britain and all gaelic/Gaul cultures, ie. a bedrock of northern celtic people and local culture & folklore, over-ruled by a mediterranean/Roman-influenced ruling & trading class. I think the Druids are a bit of a side story as they were much later arrivals during the Iron Ages, are clearly elitist and hierarchical, and are not part of the same early history of the end Bronze Age & early Iron Age settlers. Perhaps they came from the Mediterranean.

Doubt it 😂😕

Might keep a few politicians away... Hopefully..

😂 can’t remember doing that but sounds about right, I’m always editing out shouting at crows 😂✨🐦‍⬛

I know not this tale, but I LIKE IT

@@TheStoryCrow Just my own spinning of magic yarn. Bernard Cornwell's Grail Quest Trilogy is set in the 100 Years War. It's told from the POV of Thomas of Hookton, an English mercenary archer. He wears a relic of ''Saint Guineforth' a Dog/Martyr who was sainted by French peasants [clearly w/o the Church's approval]. It's a Dog's Claw or something. The legend of St Guineforth [-forte] is in Wikipedia, so it was real, if heretical. Roman Catholic Dogma has always held that animals have no immortal souls. The legend goes: A Knight had lost his beautiful young wife in childbirth. His most precious person was now his infant Son. His fief is plagued by ravenous wolves. Forever howling. He has a best friend, a massive Greyhound, Guineforte. As Handsome a Dog as he is Noble, and as Intelligent as he is Loyal, the Knight instructs Guineforte to stay at the Castle and protect his Heir. The Dog knows his duty and barks his assent. The Knight sallys forth to slay the Wolf pack. Gone all night, he is unsuccessful. When he returns to the solarium of his tower keep, he is shocked and dismayed to see the interior all torn up, tapestries ripped, crib broken, the baby not to be seen, and blood everywhere, even on the Dog's jaws... In a rage, his sword flashes out and slashes down the big Dog. The Greyhound's last move is to lick his master's hand in forgiveness. Just then, the Baby cries -- concious that something bad has happened to his dog friend and protector. The Knight realizes his error. Guineforte has stood off a pack of Wolves, protected his charge, and is now dead from a rash judgement. The Knight lowers the Dog's body down a well, rocks it in, and plants trees around the well. In time, local peasants find miraculous things are done with the Dog Saint's intersession. * * * I'm sure if a Templar subsect, devoted to St Guineforte, were hard pressed by the Avignon Antipope's Inquisitors, He would have interceded on their behalf, and allowed them to shapeshift into dog form to escape. Whether they are immortal, but stuck in dog form -- in a sort of Limbo -- is beyond my Powers to know. Their Templar's holy habit is still visable in their Dog coats' form, the Old Ones say. . May the Holy Dog lift His leg and bless us all.

That’s really interesting I didn’t know that. Could be. Etymology is a labyrinth. Now I’m thinking of thunor / Thor the slayer, specifically slayer of serpents (and trolls and giants) and how the thorn rune represents Thor (and trolls and giants). Thanks for sharing! 🙏

@@TheStoryCrow That's great, an ancient link between 'thorn' and 'slaying'! I wonder what Thor's weapons were ... actual thorns ?! Given what you say about how the thorns can cause deadly infections, a spiky Blackthorn branch could have been an effective way to get rid of enemies in days gone by, before metal weapons came about ... I hacked off a couple of branches today and they do look deadly! Perhaps the infections come from the grey 'bloom' that covers the twigs (might be a yeast like the yeast bloom on the sloes).

@@TheStoryCrow Now you've had me thinking ! I didn't know of the thorne rune and its connection to Thor. I looked it up, and the shape of the rune is actually like a thorny branch, a triangle sticking out from a stick ! The existence of this rune suggests to me that a thorn must be one of our primal concepts. 'Thorny' things were probably one of the main dangers to us in the natural world. And given that 'th' can be 'd' in other languages, I think I've worked out why Thor is also the storm god ... Blackthorn in Dutch is Sleedorn, and thorn in German is Dorn. Likewise, the old German name of Thor is Donar (site Mythology Source), and Donner means 'thunder' in German, presumably from where the word 'Donnerstag' would come from ('tag' means 'day'), which is the German word for 'Thorsday' (ie. Thursday). So I think the link between a thorn, storms and Thor is that lightning, the dramatic slayer from the sky can be seen as a powerful and deadly 'thorn' shooting down from the sky. I can't help also thinking that a lot of our European words may come from this root word/concept of thorn (possibly 'thorn' was once the plural word of a single 'thor'): such as words relating to the shape of a thorn (eg. tower/tour/tor), animals with 'thorny' heads (tauros, horn, aurochs ('os/ox/ochs' means 'cow')), and the effects of being caught by a thorn bush (tore / tear, terrier dogs), and perhaps even the horror of encounters with thickets of thorn bushes that tear and lightning that slays (terror, terrible ... ).

It was already flattish, being an English ale, before I waffled about trees for 20 minutes 😂

@@TheStoryCrow thanks for all your knowledge on the trees and entertaining stories of historical lives. well put across.just bought two hazels as a squirrel sat on my shed roof and put her order in.

Love this, thanks!

🫢

Fanks 😊