Trees and their Associations 



385 



this light by Nicander, Galen, and other 

 antient writers. I shall endeavour to treat 

 this matter in its fullest light, in the hope that 

 some key may be found to the many vexed 

 questions connected with this remarkable 

 tree. At this early stage it may be out of 

 place to venture an opinion, but still it may 

 assist you to somewhat digest the mass of 

 matter I shall lay before you. My opinion is, 

 that it has occupied the position of the 

 cypress of the East, that it has been used as 

 its substitute in this country from the remotest 

 time, and that the other observances and 

 customs connected with it in its eventful his- 

 tory has been in a manner pinned upon it. 



There is little doubt but our Pagan ances- 

 tors used its branches for sacred purposes, 

 and decked with it the graves of the dead. 

 It is supposed, with some show of reason, 

 ■hat our earliest Christian churches were 

 erected on the sites of heathen temples, and 

 that even these temples owe their origin to 

 the fact of g/oves of shady trees, invested 

 with high religious attributes, previously 

 occupying their sites. In the works of a very 

 antient Welsh bard, we are told of two 

 churches renowned for their sheltering yews. 

 One of these, " Henllan," signifies by its 

 name an antient grove. Our best authors 

 are of opinion that churches were built in 

 yew groves, or near old yew trees, rather than 

 that the trees were planted in the churchyards 

 after the churches were built. Building a 

 church was simply placing a covering over 

 the altars, and as we are aware that altars 

 were erected in groves without other covering 

 than at times a canopy of trees, we may 

 trace the custom of building churches in the 

 neighbourhood of sacred trees to very antient 

 times. We read in Moses of the devotions 

 and sacrifices of Israel among the Moabites, 

 and the idolatrous rites of the Canaanites and 

 other tribes of Gentiles, to have been per- 

 formed in groves and high places. The 

 Druids were known to have worshipped in 

 groves of the sacred oak ; but this does not 

 .set aside the claims of the yew tree, for, as it 

 symbolized immortality, it could not fail to 

 occupy a prominent position. In proof of 

 this, Plnllips quotes a table taken from the 



antient la\\-s of "Wales, from which it appears 

 that the yews were solemnly dedicated to 

 religious purposes, and v.-ere consequently 

 more highly valued than others. 



When Christianity was first introduced into 

 this country by St Augustine, it was strictly 

 enjoined by Gregory the Great that the 

 heathen temples should not be destroyed, 

 but that they were to remove the images, and 

 to wash the walls with holy water, to erect 

 their altars, &c., and to convert them into 

 Christian churches. It would appear that the 

 yew trees were allowed to remain as not 

 necessarily conveying any erroneous impres- 

 sion. As it was their policy not to interfere 

 with matters not essential, the antient obser- 

 vances of the yew tree were retained and 

 engrafted upon Christianity. In these early 

 times we have no evidence of its use further 

 than being a symbol of immortality, and a 

 tree of sacred shade. It may be noted that 

 its branches were cai.ied in solemn proces- 

 sion to the graves, and deposited therein 

 under the bodies of their friends. The 

 learned Ray asserts that this custom is still 

 observed in the North of Devon. Shak- 

 spere, whose learning is not to be despised, 

 alludes to a similar custom. Pliny speaks of 

 the use of dark evergreens for similar purposes. 

 He says — the spruce fir being a gloomy tree, its 

 branches were used to attach to doors as a 

 sign of a funeral about to take place. In 

 Sweden and Nonvay at the present day, when 

 a funeral is about to take place, the road into- 

 the churchyard and to the grave is strewn 

 with these green sprigs ; the gathering and 

 selling of which is a sort of trade for poor old 

 people about the towns. As time wore on, 

 and it became customai/ to erect crosses in 

 the churchyards, or emblems of the \ictory 

 over death achieved by the Author of our 

 faith, and the custom of interring the dead in 

 the neighbourhood of the church became 

 common, the position of the yew trees would 

 rise in importance. Their sombre hue, their 

 durability, and slowly altering features, would 

 symbol'ze the patient watching for the resur- 

 rection to those who committed the bodies of 

 their friends to the holy ground. At this 

 stage it is well to bear the fact in mind, that 



