In 1597 appeared John Gerard’s Historie of Plants, a book that quickly exerted a powerful influence on English gardeners. Despite its many errors–and its unacknowledged appropriation of lengthy passages from other sources–Gerard’s Herbal has endured as one of the great gardening books, primarily due to Thomas Johnson’s edition in 1633. My copy of Gerard’s Herbal, edited by Marcus Woodward and published in 1927, is a substantially condensed and edited version of the Gerard/Johnson folio edition, which stretches beyond 1600 pages. Although Woodward deleted over 80% of the 1633 edition, he claims to have retained the “pure essence” of Gerard’s glorious Elizabethan prose: “No word has been altered, though all that is tedious or gross has been omitted.”
Copied below are four verse renditions of Gerard’s portraits of plants. The inspiration for this project came from a writing assignment I occasionally used in my composition courses. I would ask students to transform a prose passage from an academic textbook into a poem. Students were free to rearrange the order of words and phrases, delete unnecessary verbiage, and modify the punctuation, but they were to refrain from adding their own words. The goal was to “find” the poetry in the original text.
Although the assignment certainly did not work with all writers, it would on occasion produce remarkable results–not only prompting some interesting poems but also enhancing the students’ understanding of the original author’s language and meaning. I particularly recall one morning when a student in Honors Composition came to my office, frustrated with all aspects of the assignment. To help her get started with the task, I asked her to choose a passage in her physics textbook that she found difficult to comprehend. Sitting at the computer, I began copying the passage, asking the student to identify key phrases while eliminating whatever seemed of secondary importance. Once we had the important language copied, we began making further deletions while inserting line breaks based on the emerging rhythm of the language. Suddenly the student shouted, “Oh my God, I now see what this paragraph means!”
For my own entertainment--and edification--I’ve attempted a similar approach to Gerard’s Herbal. Using the Woodward edition, I’ve chosen to play with the “histories” of several plants living in the Alumni House Garden. My revising rules were similar to what I asked of my students:
• Except for adding the plant’s scientific name, I do not introduce any words, phrases, or information not found in Gerard’s Herbal.
• Although I attempt to retain the underlying structure of Gerard’s text, I often do change the word order and the sequencing of information. For example, Gerard typically provides the various common names for a plant in the middle of his commentary; in my versions, this information is usually moved to the beginning.
• I have retained Gerard’s Elizabethan spelling; however, I frequently amend the punctuation.
While these poems may be evidence of my lack of originality, I prefer to think of these Gerard riffs as comparable to a jazz musician improvising on old melodies, bringing together a 16th-century Englishman’s understanding of the natural world with a 21st-century American’s interests and sensibilities. Although I doubt that Gerard (or Johnson) would be impressed with my renditions, I do hope they might appreciate these versifications were intended as a tribute to a text that has brought me many hours of joy and pleasure. ~Bob
Of Wilde Time
In Latine, Serpillum, a serpendo, of creeping;
in English, wilde Time, Puliall mountaine, Pella Mountaine
running Time, creeping Time, Mother of Time.
In his ninth booke of sundry Histories
Aelianus seemeth to number wild Time
among the floures: Dionysius Junior,
coming into Italy, into the city Locris,
possessed most of the houses of the city,
and did strew them with roses,
wilde Time, and other such kindes of floures.
Yet Virgil in his Bucolicks doth testifie
that wild Time is an herbe:
Thestilis for mowers tyr’d with parching heate,
Garlicke, wilde Time, strong smelling herbes doth beate.
Dioscorides and Pliny make two kinds of Serpillum.
Our common creeping Time,
so well knowne it needeth no description,
groweth upon barren hills and untoiled places,
its floures of a purple colour,
from May to the end of Summer,
as every body knoweth.
Another sort, Serpillum vulgare flore albo,
White floured Wilde Time, white as snow,
groweth in Gardens, planted in my garden,
where it becommeth an herbe of great beauty,
Wilde Time of Candy is like unto the other wild Times,
saving his leaves are narrower and longer,
more in number at each joynt.
The smell is more aromaticall than any others,
wherein is the difference.
Wilde Time helpeth against the bitings
of any venomous beast,
either taken in drinke,
or outwardly applied. Of Lavander Spike
Lavander Spike is called in Latine Lavendula,
and Spica; in Spanish, Spigo and Languda:
the first, the male; the second, the female.
Lavander hath many stiff, wooddy branches,
growing in the manner of a shrub,
with many long hoarie leaves of a strong smell,
yet pleasant to such as love strong savors.
The blew floures, spike fashion, flourish in June and July.
The temples and forehead bathed in
the distilled water of Lavander,
refreshing to them that have the Catalepsy,
a light migram and the falling sickness–
that use to swoune much.
But when an abundance of humours
it is not to be used safely,
neither is the composition to be taken
which is made of distilled wine–
in which herbes, floures, seeds, and certain spices
are infused or steeped, though
most men do rashly give them.
By using such hot things that stuffe the head,
the disease is made greater,
and the sick man brought into danger.
Every where some unlearned Physitians
and rash & overbold Apothecaries,
and other foolish women,
do give such compositions not only
to those that have the Apoplexy,
but also to those that have the Catuche
or Catalepsis with a Fever–
to whom they can give nothing worse,
and oftentimes bring death it selfe.
The floures of Lavander picked from the knaps,
the blew part, not the husk,
mixed with Cinnamon, Netmegs, & Cloves,
made into pouder,
given to drinke in the distilled water,
doth helpe the panting of the heart,
prevaileth against giddinesse,
or swimming of the braine.
A Conserve made of the floures
with sugar, profiteth much
against the diseases aforesiad,
if the quantitie of a beane
be taken in the morning fasting.
It profiteth them much that have the palsie,
if they be washed with the distilled water of the floures,
or anointed with the oile made of the floures,
and oile olive, in such maner as oile of Roses,
Of Nep or Cat-Mint
Of the Apothecaries, it is named Nepeta
The later Herbarists call it Herba Cattaria
& Herba Catti--the smell of it so pleasant unto cats,
they rub themselves upon it,
and wallow or tumble in it,
and feed on the leaves very greedily.
New growes high, stalks above a cubit long,
covered, chamfered, and full of branches:
the broad leaves are nickt in the edges
like those of Bawm or Hore-hound, but longer.
The Cat-mints floure in July and August,
after the spring. The whitish floures
partly compasse about the uppermost sprigs,
and partly grow in the very top,
set in manner of an eare or catkin.
The root, diversly parted, endureth a long time.
The leaves & stalks soft, covered with a white down,
its sharp smel pierceth into the head.
It hath a hot taste with a certain bitternesse.
Nep groweth about the borders of gardens and fields,
neere to rough banks, ditches, common wayes.
It is delighted with moist places,
and is brought into gardens.
It is a present helpe, if the juice be given
with wine or meade, for them that be bursten inwardly
by means of some fall received from an high place,
and that are very much bruised.
Of Columbine
The Names: of the later Herbarists called Columbine,
of some Aquilegia or Herba Leonis,
the herbe wherein the Lion doth delight.
The blew Columbine hath leaves like the great Celandine,
but somewhat rounder, indented on the edges,
parted into divers sections, of a blewish green colour,
which beeing broken, yeeld forth little juice
or none at all.
The stalke is a cubit and a halfe high,
slender, reddish, sleightly haired.
The slender sprigs bring forth
everie one one floure
with five little hollow hornes,
hanging forth, with small leaves
standing upright, of the shape of little birds.
They floure in May, June, and July,
these floures of colour sometimes blew,
at other times of a red or purple, often white,
or of mixt colours, which to distinguish
severally were to small purpose,
being things so familiarly known to all.
After the floures grow up cods,
in which contained little black and glittering seed.
The roots are thicke, with strings thereto belonging,
which continue many yeres.
They are set and sowne in gardens
for the beautie and colour of the floures,
to decke the gardens of the curious, garlands and houses.