BROTHER CADFAEL’S HERBAL KINGDOM
By Bea and Bill Jennings
To stroll through an herb garden is to stroll through the history of mankind. Down through the ages herbs have provided humans with medicines for illnesses, fibers for clothing, dyes for colors, cosmetics and perfumes for fragrant pleasures, and salads and culinary delights to tantalize the tastes.
Many fascinating characters of fiction have been intertwined with the history and mystery of herbs. A delightful herbalist detective is found in the medieval mystery series of 21 Chronicles in The Chronicles of Brother Cadfael created by Ellis Peters (Edith Pargeter 1913—1995). Set in 12th Century England, Brother Cadfael is a Benedictine monk who, “grows herbs and makes wines and solves murder cases”.
Brother Cadfael is introduced in the first Chronicle “on a fine, bright morning in May in the year 1137” working among the vegetables and getting ready to prepare the soil for his spring herbs. He has been in the Benedictine Abbey of St. Peter and St. Paul, at Shrewsbury, England, near the Welsh border, for 17 years.
As a young man, he went on Crusade with Godfrey de Bouillon at Antioch when the Saracens surrendered. It was during his time in the Holy Land that he learned the medicinal powers of herbs from the Saracen and Syrian physicians. During his roving time he was also able to collect seeds and plants for the eventual time that he would exchange his sword for a trowel.
After taking to the seas and becoming a sea captain for ten years against the Corsairs, Brother Cadfael entered the Benedictine Abbey of St. Peter and St. Paul at the age of 40. We meet him when he is approaching 60 years of age and is responsible for all the gardening activities of the monastery and his beloved herbarium in particular. He is also a detective and uses herbs to help his friend the local Deputy Sheriff of Shropshire Hugh Beringar.
Brother Cadfael speaks fluent Welsh and is literate in English and Latin ‘which he laboriously mastered’. Two written works on gardening referred to by Cadfael are: Palladius de Agricultura by Palladius (c. 365—425) and Colloquay (Nominum Herbarum) by Aelfric (c. 955—1010). In The Devil’s Novice, Cadfael ‘got hold of a copy of Aelfic’s list of herbs and trees from England of a century and a half earlier, and wanted peace and quiet in which to study it.’ ‘Within minutes he was absorbed in the problem of whether the “dittanders” of Aelfric was, or was not, the same as his own “dittany”.’
‘The closing of the year and the imminent arrival of winter brings the entire sequence of Chronicles to a close. In the very last novel, Brother Cadfael’s Penance, set at the end of 1145, Cadfael is found ‘standing motionless in the middle of his small, beloved kingdom, staring rather within his own mind than at the straggling, autumnal growth about him.’
Bea and Bill Jennings, Herb Garden Docents Co-Chairs
Previous Article | Back to Contents | Next Article