They say that physical pain is something that the brain compartmentalizes and ‘forgets’, or at least insists that it can’t bring to mind. I guess I can see that–we’d all be blubbering ninnies otherwise. There are exceptions of course and for me one of those poignantly recalled pain exceptions is rooted, quite literally, in the summers of my childhood.
Ah, the hot and sunny summer days of my carefree youth and the succession of happy days spent without any organization. I can remember the taste of homemade popsicles, feel the warmth of the sun-drenched wooden slats of the deck under my bare feet, and hear the sounds of a neighbourhood full of active kids of various ages enjoying the freedom from school. But I also remember the pain of stepping, full-foot, onto a thistle lying camouflaged in the grass of the front lawn.
It would only take a single step for one of those flat-to-the-ground plants to take down the average barefooted kid, who would then, howling in pain and surprise, instantly turn their foot over to search for any prickles that had been left imbedded. (Gosh, I wonder if I could still look for something stuck in the bottom of my foot, at my age?)
In my neighbourhood, the only bona fide reasons to stop the action of any game were; if someone’s mom announced a treat for the group, if one of us had been hit by a passing car (and was actively bleeding), or if someone had stepped on a ‘prickle’. Any version of sympathy that children are actually equipped with would immediately surface and each would make a face that showed horror, empathy, and relief that it was someone else this time.
It was a different tune that played out in 1263 along the shoreline of Scotland. Alexander III was the king of Scotland at that point, having had to assume the throne seven years earlier (at the age of 7) when his father died of a fever. Alex must have been mature for his age because he married his first wife, named Margaret of England (there must have been two Margarets in the community), when he was 10 years old, and she was 11. He was 14 in 1263 (and has nothing else to do with this story from here on) when the king of Norway decided that he wanted to conquer Scotland. He, the king of Norway, pushed off for Scotland with 120 of his ships loaded with Vikings. The Norsemen decided to sneak up on the sleeping Scots’ encampment one dark night, and that ambush might well have worked if one of the Vikings, the one who decided he could sneak better in his bare feet, hadn’t stepped on one of the many wild thistles that grew all over Scotland. His yelps and cries of pain (so dramatic!) woke the slumbering Scots, and the Vikings were driven back to their boats and into a full retreat by their now-infuriated intended victims.
And that, dear children, is apparently the legend of how and why Scotland crowned a local weed as its national flower.
(Sidebar: Canada doesn’t have a national flower—instead, they’ve put the onus on each of the provinces/territories to come up with their own, which comes across as lazy to me.)
The vast thistle family boasts members whose flowers range from white to pale blue to mauve/violet/purple to bright yellow. The artichoke is actually an edible member of the family who, if left to dawdle away its life uneaten, would produce a very pretty mop of light purple petals. Bees and several butterflies love the thistle, as do goldfinches, hummingbirds, some swallowtails, and donkeys (Eeyore specifically). Because of the prickles, the rest of us aren’t quite as enamoured with the plant.
The thistle has covered itself with those all too familiar prickles in order to defend itself from most grazing animals. (Well, THAT worked!) There are sharp prickles everywhere on a thistle’s stem and on its leaves and even around its flower. That’s what makes it Enemy Number One to humans, if we insist on going barefoot all summer long.
And we do.
Mind you, it’s not all hate. In Portugal, they use thistle flowers as rennet for a certain type of cheese that they make from sheep’s milk. Mmmmm, I’d try that!
The French translation of the word thistle is chardon. This went on to be the name given to a presumably thistle-y town in the Maconnais region of France, which in turn is the town where the Chardonnay grape is believed to have originated. I’ll wait here while you run off and pour yourself a glass in homage. To the thistle!
Back in medieval times, the thistle was thought to have the abilities to grow hair out of a balding pate. I, for one, would like to see the research behind that claim. Later, during the Early Modern Period (roughly mid 15th to late 18th centuries), the thistle was used as a fix for such things as headaches, jaundice, The Plague (!), vertigo, and skin lesions due to cancer.
These days we turn to transplants for hair loss and Tylenol for headaches, but the chemicals derived from the Milk Thistle are being studied as part of the treatment of liver and gallbladder problems, Hep C, diabetes, indigestion, and studies continue on the effectiveness of it working against jaundice. We’ve moved on to using antibiotics to combat The Plague.
Regardless of what the cheesemakers, naturopaths, scientists, and pollinators think, most humans continue to cast a suspicious and menacing eye at those thistles that we have the misfortune to come across. We have trod on, sat in, brushed by, and tried to dig up, too many of them to think that we will somehow become friends with this bite-y and prickly weed.
So, while the thistle has its good points, we will continue to complain about its mean ones—unless we find ourselves dealing with a bunch of sneaking shoeless Vikings who are planning a takeover. Under the cover of night.
Enjoy the summer ahead (Happy First Day!) but watch your step.
