iii: Anthroposophical Views
In the search for times lost Dora Wagner It is only with the heart that you can see rightly. What is essential is invisible to your eyes. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1943)
In my language, we call it Weißdorn— ‘Whitethorn’ —because these shrubs and small trees turn into nature's bridal bouquet when they flower in Spring. Hawthorn (Crataegus spp.) blooms early in Germany: its opulent white blossoms appear in April, bursting with flowers grouped together in small panicles, its pointed thorns and small, diamond-shaped leaves barely visible between all the flowers. As a little girl, I was firmly convinced that the fairy who lives in the Hawthorn had put on her wedding dress, celebrating the reawakening of nature in the cycle of the year. In anthroposophical medicine, the essential connections between humans and the natural world are always considered. This is deeply personalised— the plant communicates differently to different people, who draw on their own feelings, intuitions, memories and metaphors. For me, Hawthorn is resonant with family and fairy tale. It was my grandmother who taught me to distinguish between the Common Hawthorn (Crataegus monogyna) and the Woodland Hawthorn (Crataegus laevigata), to notice the small, barely perceptible differences in the flower structure. I loved the tales she told me about these ‘fairy trees’, and how, in Roman antiquity, Hawthorn was the sacred tree of the double-headed god Janus, who— looking simultaneously into the future and the past —symbolises the passage of time. To my aunt, Hawthorn was ‘Christ's thorn’. In the legend she told, the crown of thorns— symbol of the mockery and
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suffering inflicted on Jesus by Roman soldiers —was woven from Hawthorn twigs, and the Hawthorn flower’s stamen received their red colour from the blood of Christ. As a child my family took me to visit Sababurg, the original Sleeping Beauty’s castle, where I sorrowed for the giantess Saba who was murdered after building it. I preferred the castle as described by the Brothers Grimm, surrounded by a long and high hedge of thorns. This hedge was probably of Weißdorn— and the spindle with which Dornröschen pricked herself, so the tale goes, was made of hard Hawthorn wood. Her sleep was deep and peaceful, and she lived happily ever after under the Hawthorn’s protection from villains, demons and pathogens. In those circumstances, it might be easy to sleep for a hundred years. Crataegus lights up for a second time in autumn, when its small, roundish fruits turn blood-red. White in spring, red in autumn: this is how Hawthorn delights us all year round. But Hawthorn is not only a sensual heart’s delight— it has provided protection and security for people since they became settled. Its hedgerows, dense and thorny, was a natural protective fence for their livestock— and, as the animals eat the tasty young shoots, the hedge grows to become even tighter and more impenetrable. These hedges also provide food and shelter for many species of birds and mammals. Its flowers are important food for nectarsucking insects and the larvae of a number of butterfly species; its berries are a crucial food source for birds and wildlife in winter.
