Botanical lore

Although ivy is not a tree in a commonly understood sense, it is the only member of its family of climbers (aralia) found in northern woodlands to carpet ground, trees, rocks or walls. Growing up to a height of seventy feet, it does not strangle its host tree (contrary, again, to the common understanding), however ivy does frequently block out the light from reaching its host tree. Able to live with minimal light, ivy may completely carpet ground in woodland, yet it does well on various soils or even simply minerals, such as old walls, and can live for hundreds of years.

 

With tiny rootlets that take hold of a tree surface, ivy shoots begin their climb. These shoots have shiny, dark-green leaves, three or five-lobed, with white veins. If used in decoctions, these leaves can cure ear and eye problems, loosening mucus in sinusitis and bronchitis. Once established in a shady place, a different form of ivy leaf and shoot appear, one that does not require to climb and which grows instead the heart shaped, pointed leaves which can be effective to the lower part of the human body, such as the spleen or on corns.

 

These larger leaves produce bunches of yellow green flowers which turn to black berries in autumn, with three to five seeds to each berry. Although eaten by birds, who distribute the seed, the berries are inedible to humans (and horses). From early (Neolithic) times the leaves were used for animals, hence an old german name of ep-heu, (heu being hay). 

aralia family: araliaceae ivy (hedera helix)

 

Mythology

Dedicated to Osiris in ancient Egypt and to Dionysus in Greece, the ivy is associated with the wild. Along with the vine, priests and followers of Dionysus wore ivy wreaths in wild ceremonies and the leaf, though toxic, is hallucinatory. Curiously, cups made of ivy wood counterbalance unwanted side effects of alcohol, and later, in the Middle Ages, ivy leaves mashed in vinegar were used to soothe a hangover.

 

In fact, well into the nineteenth century, many english pubs displayed a large ivy wreath hanging outside. Both vine and ivy grow spirally and both symbolise resurrection (strength preserved in the wine and the spiral of the years). Widely understood as the counterpart of the holly, where the 'holly boy' complements (and competes with) the 'ivy girl', branches of both are brought into the house at Christmas throughout England and Wales.