Ogham Studies - Ioho (Yew)

[Serpentia]

Juniper makes sense since it is often found in hedges, whereas the Yew is much to large and too unruly to be sized down like that.

Juniper, by the way, is another one of those trees that are missing in the Ogham and that I may have to add to my own collection. I don't particularly care for them, especially not their taste (in Germany, people like to cook with their berries, we call them "Wacholder") but I read recently that juniper trees are also known for extreme longevity and used to be worshipped somewhere.. wonder if I can find that tidbit again.

Miriam, the bark is very typical of yew, it's sort of reminiscent of birch but brown, and it flakes off easily - quite a big difference to all "normal" pine trees. The trunks are rather small around. Plus, they grow not as one tree, but as several (trunks). Their growth is quite unruly and if I were to give them a shape, it would be sort of zig-zaggy all the way around. And you can literally walk into them...

Serpentia
The Yew-loving Snake

[Mountainheart]

Juniper is one of my favourite trees, although it can often appear more like a shrub. There are some beautiful and very old Juniper groves on the slopes of Place Fell in the Lake District (England). It's supposed to be an aphrodisiac but I find that adding the crushed berries to a bath is very relaxing and sleep inducing, instead!

David

[Serpentia]

Wow, I just looked and the bark looks just like Yew! How exciting, no wonder you can get them confused, as long as the yew is still young at least. They grow quite different in form.

There we go, adding Juniper to my personal Ogham now.

[Dathi]

A couple of Yew pikkies from the Irish National Botanical Gardens http://www.botanicgardens.ie/ .

I love the way they twist and turn. It gives a sense of being a witness to the ages, following the events and contortions of time.

gnarley2.jpg (170.35 KiB) Viewed 3093 times

gnarley1.jpg (195.82 KiB) Viewed 3093 times

I'm intrigued by this description: "In the bardic schools, poets used staves of yew to help them memorize long incantations. We hear tell how the poet Cesarn "cut (the words) in Ogam into 4 rods of yew. Each was 24' long and had 8 sides. "
http://www.druidry.org/obod/trees/yew.html

CFN,

Dathi

[Mountainheart]

I'm intrigued by this description: "In the bardic schools, poets used staves of yew to help them memorize long incantations. We hear tell how the poet Cesarn "cut (the words) in Ogam into 4 rods of yew. Each was 24' long and had 8 sides. "

You can read more about this at http://www.druidry.org/obod/lore/coelbren/coelbren.html

Thx
David