Starting a little #ThickTrunkTuesday series today: every week a short 🧵on a different #Tree and its #historicalecology, meanings, uses, #Mythology etc.
Today it’s the #Yew - a tree I’ve been intrigued by ever since we first came across this big old yew tree next to #Wilmington church here in #Sussex. It’s over 1,500 years old and pretty amazing! 1/x
5/x So many #UK churches were built next to already existing Yew trees. There are various hypotheses around this, but all stem from the fact that #Yews were long (long before Christianity) sacred trees, due to their longevity and also perhaps because they are so poisonous. You can read a lot online but I particularly enjoyed this #BBCSounds #NaturalHistories #podcast with Brett Westwood (a really wonderful series all round by the way)
6/x But it's not just in the #UK, throughout Europe there is a long history of #Yew #Mythology - both as #TreeOf Death and #TreeOfLife. In Greek Mythology the way to #Hades is lined with Yews, and some suggest #Yggdrasil, the amazing #Norse tree of life, may have been a Yew
@pvonhellermannn 'Tree of life' may not be the worst name for them as yew trees are also the original source of an essential chemotherapy drug, Taxol (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paclitaxel).
I'm definitely keeping an eye out for yew trees near Dutch churches, curious if the practice occurred here too. Thanks for the interesting posts!
Pauline von Hellermann
anomalocaris