(Spiraea filipendula, Filipendula ulmaria
Spiraea ulmaria)
Folk Names: Bride of the Meadow, Bridewort, Dollor, Gravel Root, Lady of
the Meadow, Little Queen, Meadowort, Queen of the Meadow, Steeplebush,
Trumpet Weed
Gender: Masculine
Planet: Jupiter
Element: Air
Powers: Love, Divination, Peace, Happiness
Magical Uses: Fresh meadowsweet is placed on the altar for love spells, or dried is used for various
love mixtures. Also strewn about the house to keep peace. The scent of meadowsweet cheers the heart.
If gathered on Midsummer, meadowsweet will give you information regarding thieves; if you have been robbed, place meadowsweet on water. If it sinks, the thief is a man. If it floats, a woman.
[From Cunningham's Encyclopedia of Magical Herbs]
Meadowsweet - Queen of the Prairie
This blooming herb is almond-scented with creamy white flowers. This was a popular flower in bridal bouquest, which helped earn the flower some of its folk names, like bridal wort. This was a classic strewing herb in medieval times, for not only the flowers were fragrant, but the foliage had a clean hay scent as well. Meadowsweet was also popular for use in the creation of perfume, as oil from the flower buds is sweetly scented. It is also a classic drying herb, the flower tops yield a yellow-green dye, the leaves and stems a blue tint, and the roots yield a black dye.
This was a sacred herb in the Druidic tradition, and it formed a sort of magickal trio of herbs with vervain and mint. Meadowsweet is popular to work into faerie magick, as the fae vaue strongly scented flowers and herbs. In magick, the meadowsweet flower is worked into spells, arranged into tussie-mussies, and tucked into sweetly fragranced charm bags and sachets to encourage love and good cheer. Meadowsweet promotes peace and contentment, and it also aids in divination. It is one of the fifty ingredients in a drink called 'Save,' mentioned in Chaucer's Knight's Tale, in the fourteenth century being called Medwort, or Meadwort, i.e. the mead or honey-wine herb, and the flowers were often put into wine and beer. It is still incorporated in many herb beers.
Filipendula ulmaria, commonly known as Meadowsweet, is a perennial herb in the family Rosaceae, which grows in damp meadows. It is native throughout most of Europe and western Asia though it has been successfully introduced and naturalized in North America.
The stems are 1–2 m (3-7 ft) tall, erect and furrowed, reddish to sometimes purple. The leaves are dark green on the upper side and whitish and downy underneath, much divided, interruptedly pinnate, having a few large serrate leaflets and small intermediate ones. Terminal leaflets are large, 4–8 cm long and three to five-lobed.
Meadowsweet has delicate, graceful, creamy-white flowers clustered close together in handsome irregularly-branched cymes, having a very strong, sweet smell. They flower from June to early September.
The herb is probably best known for its chemical components, which have made it popular throughout history as a remedy for aches and fever. Meadowsweet was the key headache-busting ingredient from which aspirin was synthesized; Bayer Pharma-ceuticals used dried meadowsweet leaves for its original methyl salicylic acid formulation. In Colonial times, meadowsweet was used as an anti-inflammatory to reduce the symptoms of arthritis and rheumatism. And, because the herb is gentle on the stomach, it also was used to treat stomach upsets, feverish colds, diarrhea and heartburn. Meadowsweet belongs to the rose family (Rosaceae), and was Queen Elizabeth I’s favorite strewing herb. The 16th-century herbalist Gerard believed it outranked all other strewing herbs because its aromatic leaves didn’t cause headaches, unlike many other strongly scented leaves. Meadowsweet’s popularity as a strewing herb at weddings earned it its alternate name, bridewort.
And throughout history, meadowsweet has maintained its usefulness in the home. Housewives used the plant in their cleaning routine, drying clusters of tiny white florets and placing them on the floor and in cabinets to mask unpleasant odors. Cooks used the herb to flavor beers, meads and wines and added it to soups for an interesting almond flavor. As a cosmetic, it was soaked in rainwater and used as astringent and skin conditioner.
Plants grown in organically enriched, well-watered soil will produce a healthy rhizome. Meadowsweet is a good candidate to grow in moist meadows or near bodies of water, where the herb blooms from June through August. And while the versatile herb can grow in full or partial sun, in boggy soil where summers are cool, or in latitudes where summers are warm to hot, meadowsweet does require some attention. It reacts well to heavy compost at least once each season. And if leaves become tattered in the summer, severely prune them and keep soil moist until new leaves emerge.
Use fresh leaves to flavor sorbets and fruit salads. You can infuse the flower to make a mild diuretic tea. Meadowsweet has a sharp flavor, somewhat like burnet, so you can drop a leaf into a cup of claret wine and enjoy the bite it offers. When making tea, cover the brew and let it steep to bring out the salicylic acid before serving to guests. No one will leave with a headache.
So the blooms are cream and not lavender? It's hard to tell in the pictures.
ReplyDeleteBut almond scented? Mmmmmm.