RE: VMs: Calendar, sun and moon

["Brian Tawney" <btawney@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> There was a discussion a while ago ,comparing the vms  with an
agro-almanac.
> I don't know of any change in a plant state during night as opposed with
> daylight. This is quite interesting, I don't know if it was studied
before.
> There seem to be some nocturnal influence over the living things.
> The only thing I heared is that ther are  plants which need to be
> collected in some specific time of year for specific results, this
circulates
> in my folklore.

There are flowers which close up at night and open up in the morning.  There
are also flowers which are only fragrant in the evening (like honeysuckle).
So some plants do change state at night, but I don't know why an agronomist
might be interested in these.

In terms of ritual, I think it's not uncommon to gather certain materials at
certain times of day or night, for example practitioners of Voudou gather
graveyard earth in the half hour before and after midnight.

Just poking around on the web, I found the following quote regarding
medieval European beliefs about herbs:
(http://www.geocities.com/annafranklin2/mann.html)

"As the Midsummer the sun reaches the point of greatest power and light it
imbues herbs with special magical and healing properties. This is the most
potent time for gathering herbs, especially sun-colored flowers such as St.
John's wort. Other plants acquire strange properties; an elder cut on
Midsummer Eve, for example, will bleed real blood, or fern seeds can confer
the gift of invisibility if gathered at midnight. Anything round and rayed
suggests the sun itself, including the rose and daisy.

"A belief in the magical powers of herbs at Midsummer was common throughout
Europe and the Middle East. At one time plants were hung up all over on St.
John's Eve. In 1598 the historian John Stow wrote of the sight in London:

"'Every man's door was shaded with green birch, fennel, St. John's wort,
orpin, white lilies, and the like, ornamented with garlands of beautiful
flowers. They.had also lamps of glass with oil burning in them all night;
and some of them hung out branches of iron, curiously wrought, containing
hundreds of lamps lighted at once, which made a splendid appearance.'

"Witches believe that plants gathered at the time of the summer solstice are
endowed with distinct magical characteristics."

Brian Tawney


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