Re: garden trivia

You must have a fantastic memory.
Kitty
neIN, Z5
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Zemuly Sanders" <zsanders@midsouth.rr.com>
To: <gardenchat@hort.net>
Sent: Thursday, October 20, 2005 7:05 PM
Subject: Re: [CHAT] garden trivia


> What a great story, Kitty.  I always like to include interesting stories
> whenever I speak about plants -- especially to a non-plant group.  I also
> appreciate interesting stories from others.  When I went to Italy last
year
> with my grandson and his Latin class I was able to tell all sorts of tales
> related to the plants we saw.  The teens, and Zach's Latin teacher, all
told
> me how much they enjoyed the stories.
> zem
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: <kmrsy@netzero.net>
> To: <gardenchat@hort.net>
> Sent: Thursday, October 20, 2005 5:07 PM
> Subject: Re: [CHAT] garden trivia
>
>
> > Auralie and Zem,
> > Those are great stories. I think it's fun sometimes to know a bit of
> > background about our plants. Puts us on a more "intimate" footing with
> > them.
> >
> >
> > When I was writing a self-guided tour for our gardens I looked up Scotch
> > Thistle, Onopordum acanthium, the national emblem of Scotland.
> > Apparently these 6ft to 10ft thistles saved the lives of soldiers and
> > the entire kingdom from a night-time invasion (from whom I don't recall
> > - but they came in boats) The marauders thought they could sneak up on
> > Scotland at night under a negligible moon. But without the moonlight
> > they kept running into thistles and screaming out in pain, thus alerting
> > the sleeping guards.
> >
> >
> > Kitty
> >
> > -- "Zemuly Sanders" <zsanders@midsouth.rr.com> wrote:
> > Auralie, thanks for all that good info.  I just adore trivia and have
some
> > of my own to add.  In 1676 British soldiers in North America were
> > commanded
> > to go to Jamestown to suppress a rebellion.  They were acutely short of
> > food
> > and, out of ignorance or through a misunderstanding, they they cooked up
> > the
> > young shoots and leaves of Datura stramonium and ate them as a
vegetable.
> > After a while they showed strange changes in their behavior.  They fell
> > into
> > a type of trance or "comical madness" that made them have all sorts of
> > foolish notions and act stupidly.  One of them tried again and again to
> > make
> > a feather climb in the air and another threw straw until he was
completely
> > exhausted.  A third sat stark naked in a corner and contorted his face
> > like
> > an ape into a continual grin.  Everything they did was totally
> > non-violent;
> > they were simply good-naturedly idiotic.  Since those days, the
colloquial
> > name for Datura stramonium in North America has been "Jamestown weed,"
> > which
> > over time became "Jimson weed."
> > zem
> >
> > ----- Original Message ----- 
> > From: <Aplfgcnys@aol.com>
> > To: <gardenchat@hort.net>
> > Sent: Thursday, October 20, 2005 2:11 PM
> > Subject: Re: [CHAT] garden trivia
> >
> >
> >> In a message dated 10/20/2005 2:02:04 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
> >> 4042N15@nationalhearing.com writes:
> >> New York Aster, Aster novi-belgii
> >>
> >> Novi-belgii is Linnaeus' attempt to translate New Amsterdam (now New
> >> York)
> >> into Latin; the Belgii were the tribe encountered by Julius Caesar in
the
> >> Low Countries.
> >>
> >> It's not a No play, but interesting nonetheless.  Anyone else with a
> >> tidbit
> >> to share?
> >>
> >> Kitty
> >> Did you really mean that, Kitty?  I am fascinated with such trivia.
> >> Here are just a few:
> >>
> >> The wildflower Muilla is an anagram derived by spelling its onion
> >> relative
> >> (Allium) backwards.
> >>
> >>    The name nasturtium comes from the Latin nasus, bnose,b and
tortus,
> >> b
> >> twisted,b because their pungent smell makes the nose wrinkle or twist.
> >> The
> >> botanical name is from the Greek tropaion, ba trophy,b referring to
the
> >> shield-like shape of the leaves.  In ancient Greece, the shields and
> >> helmets
> >> of defeated
> >> enemies were fixed onto tree trunks.  Linnaeus saw the plant twining up
a
> >> post and thought the leaves looked like hanging shields and the flowers
> >> like
> >> helmets.
> >>
> >>   Celandine can be a noxious weed, but it is also an interesting and
> >> attractive plant. When it is called by its botanical name and described
> >> with
> >> an
> >> impartial eye, do you recognize Chelidonium majus?    bChelidonb is
the
> >> Greek word
> >> for bswallowb, and the name for this plant is probably derived from
the
> >> fact
> >> that it begins to burgeon when the swallows arrive in spring and dies
> >> back
> >> when they leave again in autumn.  Legend has it that swallows use a
sprig
> >> of
> >> this plant, or its juice, to restore the sight of their young when
these
> >> cannot
> >> see.  Herbalist John Gerard debunked this belief, because, he thought,
as
> >> did
> >> Aristotle a millennium earlier, that the sight of blinded young birds
> >> would be
> >> restored spontaneously.   Carrying this plant on onebs person,
together
> >> with
> >> the heart of a mole, was supposed to enable the wearer to vanquish his
> >> enemies, and also to win lawsuits.  Also, worn in the shoes, it was a
> >> remedy
> >> for
> >> yellow jaundice.
> >>
> >> .  Atropa belladonna, commonly called bdeadly nightshadeb is named
for
> >> Atropos, a Greek goddess who determined the length of onebs life.  It
is
> >> a
> >> European
> >> plant, and is a member of the Solanaceae family.
> >>
> >>   Maclura pomifera, or Osage oranges were named after the Osage Indians
> >> of
> >> Arkansas and Missouri, and brought East by the Lewis and Clark
> >> expedition.
> >> French explorers named the tree bois dbarc, or bbow wood,b which was
> >> corrupted to bBodark,b a name given to some towns in the Midwest,
where
> >> the fruits
> >> are sometimes called bBodark apples.b    The fruits, which look
> >> remarkably
> >> like
> >> brains, are an effective cockroach deterrant. If they had been known in
> >> Europe in the Middle Ages they would surely have been used for ailments
> >> of
> >> the
> >> head, following the bDoctrine of Signatures.b The botanical name,
> >> Maclura,
> >> was
> >> given in honor of William Maclure, who came from Scotland to America as
a
> >> young
> >> man, made a great fortune, and devoted the rest of his life to
improving
> >> the
> >> world.  He believed in the value of education in democracy, and toured
> >> Europe
> >> observing and commenting on religion, education, hygiene and sexual
> >> customs.
> >> He made the first geological map of the United States.
> >>
> >>  The herb, thyme, was introduced into Britain by the Romans, and listed
> >> by
> >> Aelfric.  As an emblem of courage, thyme was added to soups and beer to
> >> cure
> >> shyness.  During the middle Ages, ladies presented their bbold and
> >> braveb
> >> knights with bfavoursb embroidered with a sprig of thyme.   The
> >> plantbs
> >> botanical
> >> name, Thymus, is derived from either the Greek for courage or to
> >> fumigate,
> >> the
> >> latter referring to its use as incense in temples.
> >>
> >> Dahlias are called after Dr. Anders Dahl, a Swedish botanist.  Until
> >> recently
> >> they were also called bgeorginas,b after the botanist Johann Georgi
of
> >> Petersburg.  The name is still used in Eastern Europe.
> >>   Peonies were for many centuries grown for medicinal purposes. The
> >> botanical name, Paeonia, comes from Paeon, the physician of the Greek
> >> gods. In
> >> the
> >> Iliad there is a description of Paeon stanching wounds with herbs.
Some
> >> stories
> >> say that Asclepias became jealous of Paeon because he possessed the
> >> healing
> >> root and Zeus changed Paeon into a plant to save him.   Pliny the
Elder,
> >> who
> >> died in the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD, attributed to it the power
to
> >> cure
> >> twenty different ills.  He said it should only be uprooted at night
> >> bbecause
> >> the
> >> woodpecker of Mars, should he see the act, will attack the eyes in its
> >> defense.
> >> b
> >>
> >>  What we usually think of today when we speak of Marigolds are several
> >> species of Tagetes.  Now therebs a real native species, which we can
> >> grow
> >> without
> >> any guilt about bringing in non-natives.  All species of Tagetes are
> >> native to
> >> the New World, from Arizona and New Mexico to Argentina.  They were
taken
> >> back
> >> to Spain by early explorers, and from there to France, where they were,
> >> for
> >> some reason called flos Africanus. Linnaeus gave them the name Tagetes,
> >> in
> >> honor of Tages, the grandson of Jupiter who taught the Etruscans
> >> haruspicy
> >> (the
> >> art of foretelling the future by examining entrails).  These are the
> >> bFrenchb
> >> or bAfricanb types.
> >>
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