Heritage Plants - Thursday, 8th March 2018

This fabulously instructive talk was given by Susie White. In her Gardener's World featured garden (2014), Susie has planted her new Northumbrian garden using drifts of contemporary and heritage / antique plants. Here extremes of temperature have been recorded, -18c to 30c!

Before 2010, Susie and her husband gardened at the walled garden near Chesters and ran the Old Potting Shed Shop. The Chesters site contained national herb collections of which one was thyme.

Below is a record of thoughts about some of Susie's favourite heritage plants.

Roman herbs were used in a variety of ways:

dyes / culinary / spiritual / household

(fig leaves being used as loo paper)

Marshmallow – Althaea officinalis

Mallow was an edible vegetable among the Romans; a dish of marsh mallow was one of their delicacies! It also has soothing properties and has been used for lozenges. It was also used in the development of the sweet by the same name.

Chives - Allium schoenoprasum

Susie reminds us that the flowers themselves have a wonderful strong flavour and are decorative. Her favourite varieties are Pink Perfection & Black Isle Blush.

Marjoram - Origanum majorana

The Romans used marjoram in cooking when it's strong aroma could disguise inferior meats. It was also used for dying.

Ground Elder / Bishop's Weed - Aegopodium podagraria

Another Roman introduction! It is edible and was used to treat gout using an external wrap. Susie sees merit in this plant as a foil for roses, if you can contain it!!!

Woodruff / Baby's Breath – Galium odoratum

Woodruff indicates the presence of ancient woodlands. It contains coumarins which are present in hay. This gives the sweet smell which persists with drying. The ruff has been linked to the shape for rose windows in churches. 

Lungworts / Mary's Tears – Pulmonaria officinalis

The plant has been cultivated for centuries as a medicinal herb, the ovate spotted leaves held to be representative of diseased lungs, following the Doctrine of Signatures. In the Middle Ages, Christian doctors believed that plants similar to any body part could be used to treat illnesses in this part since God put his signature in the plant to guide mankind.

Sweet Cicely - Myrrhis odorata

This is a tall (6') herbaceous plant that is softly hairy and smells strongly of aniseed when crushed. It was used as a natural sweetner. Beware not to confuse it with hemlock which is poisonous. (Hemlock has a mousy smell).

Lady's Mantle - Alchemilla mollis et al

This is an invasive species but has wonderful foliage & flowers. To control it, cut to ground level before flowers go over. In ten days new leaves appear.

Water beads on the leaves collect in the rain. These beads of water were considered by alchemists to be the purest form of water. They used this water in their quest to turn base metal into gold, hence the name Alchemilla. 

 St. John's Wort - Hypericum perforatum

Referred to as “nature's prozac”; some studies have supported the efficacy of St John's wort as a treatment for depression in humans, but have not concluded it as a replacement for more studied treatments and proper medical consultation.

The leaves are yellow-green in colour, with scattered translucent dots of glandular tissue. The dots are conspicuous when held up to the light, giving the leaves the 'perforated' appearance to which the plant's Latin name refers. When flower buds (not the flowers themselves) or seed pods are crushed, a reddish/purple liquid is produced.

Thyme

The spread of thyme throughout Europe was thought to be due to the Romans, as they used it to purify their rooms and to "give an aromatic flavour to cheese and liqueurs". In the Middle Ages, the herb was placed beneath pillows to aid sleep and ward off nightmares. In this period, women also often gave knights and warriors gifts that included thyme leaves, as it was believed to bring courage to the bearer. Thymes are best cultivated in a hot, sunny location with well-drained soil. Susie's own experience is that Thymus longicaulis can survive in -18c

Bergamot / Scarlet Beebalm - Monarda didyma

Not to be confused with Bergamot Oranges used in perfumes and Earl Grey Tea. Bergamot is a decorative plant. It is also the natural source of the antiseptic thymol, the primary active ingredient in modern commercial mouthwash formulas.

Remember new plant discoveries often come from the wild

e.g. Anthriscus sylvestris 'Ravenswing'

This cow parsley was discovered by Hexham botanist, John Richard. It bears clusters of tiny, cream-white flowers in contrast with lacy, dark purple foliage. It's perfect for growing in a large informal border or cottage garden scheme, and 
in meadows among ornamental grasses.

e.g. The Apothecary's Rose - Rosa gallica officinalis & Rosa mundi

As it sometimes happens, Henry II had a mistress named Jane Clifford, later renamed (according to legend) The Fair Rosamond. Henry's wife Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine got wind of this affair, concocted a poison to give her husband’s mistress, and disguised the deadly potion with the oil of the Apothecary’s Rose and R. alba. After Rosamond’s death, so the legend goes, a new rose sprouted outside the castle 
 one of both red and white stripes , called Rosa mundi. 

About Susie... 

Susie is a freelance garden writer, photographer and author. A lifelong and passionate gardener, she spent 23 years at Chesters Walled Garden on Hadrian’s Wall making it a place much loved by visitors. Here she developed her free flowing planting style, which owes much to herbs, wildflowers, childhood plants and unusual perennials.

With her husband David Oakley, she has made a new garden in a hidden valley in Northumberland. Each step was shared with readers of the English Garden magazine, in a two year long series on making a garden from scratch – featured on Gardener's World 2014.

Susie contributes to a variety of garden and travel magazines. She is the garden columnist for My Weekly magazine and has been the garden columnist for the Northumbrian magazine for eleven years.

 Written by PMR

Various reference sources used