Category: spiritual symbolism

The Lime/Linden Tree – a “lesser” tree in the eyes of Ancient Britons?

December 9th, 2025

The linden tree. It stood unchanged since the first time Papa Horatio had seen it, all those years ago— unchanged, Alaine thought, for perhaps centuries. Always green, always blooming, even in the middle of winter. Now, at the cresting of summer, it almost blended into the deep green of the forest, except for the perfect circle of velvet green surrounding it. That, and the scent. Ebbing like a tide on the gentle breeze that stirred the linden’s leaves, the perfume mingled the ordinary golden florals of linden blooms with strange notes of vanilla and cedar and incense.” ~ Rowenna Miller, The Fairy Bargains of Prospect Hill

The Lime/Linden tree (genus Tilia) has a place among the “sacred” tree types of Europe. You’ll find it referenced in Slavic, Baltic, Germanic, and Greek mythologies… and even into Asia, in northern China. It also remains a national symbol of the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, and of the Sorbs in Lusatia. Yet, when it comes to the Brythonic/Brittonic languages, words seem to struggle to find shared meaning and significance. Was that a reflection of lesser appreciation or respect?

At first, I thought… perhaps… but then, maybe I shouldn’t be so hasty.

In Welsh, breaking down the compound word, pisgwydden (plural: pisgwydd)… the first part, pisg, isn’t well-documented, and by itself, can mean blisters or pods. Yet, when combined with gwydden (gwŷdd, meaning “trees” or “wood”… by the way, that double “dd” should actually roll off the tongue as a “th” sound), it refers to the Linden tree.

The Cornish word (pry, prye, or prys), however, does not align (at least in my opinion) so smoothly in sound against the Welsh pisg, and I struggle to see shared origins in a Common Brythonic word.

That being said, I also saw a reference to the Cornish word Elowen (relating to Elaw/Elow) being associated with the Linden… though it actually means “Elm tree”. In this instance, the similarly sounding Breton word for the Linden is… evlec’h (or *evlec‘).

So, what’s going on?

At this point, I found it might be worth “climbing” from Brittonic, further up into the Insular Celtic linguistic tree, and then back down the other side, to Goidelic (Scots Gaelic, Irish Gaelic, etc.).

In doing so, I found the Gaelic word for linden tree (or lime tree) is crann-teile (Scottish Gaelic) or teile (Irish Gaelic)… both, clearly connecting to the genus name Tilia. The crann (tree) or craobh, means tree… and relates to the Gaelic leamhán (which, I would argue, sounds much like the Cornish elow/elaw).

I had to wonder if… in elow/elaw and leamhán, was I seeing something significant tied to the Old Germanic word for law (hinting at a possible connection in the Proto-Indo-European linguistic tree). After all, the Linden tree was symbolic for peace and justice (as well as… love, fertility, friendship, healing, protection, endurance, and renewal). Lindens were traditionally seen as a sacred space where no lies could be told. It was the site for assemblies, legal proceedings, and important judgments. Not to mention… the word law comes from the Old English lagu, which was borrowed from the Old Norse lagu, meaning “things laid down or fixed,” derived from lag (“layer, measure”), ultimately from a Proto-Germanic root related to “to lie” or “to lay”. This highlights law as something established or set, unlike Latin-derived terms like lex or legal, which come from roots meaning “to gather” or “to bind,” showing different cultural approaches to defining law (laid down vs. gathered rules).

Yet, as I kept unraveling, it seemed more likely that I had encountered a homophone… the whole “sounds like.. but isn’t the same”.

Looking just at the Gaelic leamhán, I found it could mean a number of things… from elm tree, to a moth (particularly a clothes moth), and even to the marshmallow plant… which shares linguistic roots related to softness or weakness.

Wait, wait… softness or weakness?

Without going too far down yet another path, it’s probably worth noting that the Linden tree is soft and easy to carve, making it suitable for instruments, furniture, and sculptures.

It seems the further I go, the more uncertainties and/or possibilities there are.

Back to my original question, then…

Was the Linden tree of lesser importance to Britons? More specifically, I wonder if it was less significant to Britons, say… prior to the arrival (ca. 410 AD/CE) of the Anglo-Saxons, who… perhaps… brought with them the significance of Germanic symbolism of the Linden?

I can’t find a definitive answer, and given the timeline and scant history, it really shouldn’t surprise me.

Coming down the historical timeline, the Linden seems to have held some significance in Britain. J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings certainly left us tastes of its enchantment in both Aragon’s Song of Lúthien…

He heard there often the flying sound/Of feet as light as linden-leaves.

… and Legolas Song of Nimrodel…

And in the wind she went a light/As leaf of linden tree.

… both, seemingly, influenced by Geoffrey Chaucer’s (ca. 1343-1400) Canterbury Tales…

Be ay of chiere as light as leef on lynde,
And lat hym care, and wepe, and wrynge, and waille!”*

I’m curious, though. Even with the boost from Tolkien, how did the Linden get left out in the contemporary sacred Pagan trees of the Wheel of the Year?

So ends today’s journey in the Brittonic…

*Be ever of cheer as light as a leaf on a linden tree,
And let him (your husband) care, and weep, and wring his hands, and wail!”)
“You’re not a Viking”- a problem with too quickly belittling identity in ancestral DNA

December 5th, 2025

On one hand, I get it… in fact, just this past summer, while in Norway, I had an interesting exchange with a Norwegian about DNA and an American’s (for example) claims of “being” German, Dane, Irish, Scots, or whatever. I agreed that an American should not claim that they “ARE” any one of these if they did not grow out of the respective, contemporary cultures. But, to say they “have origins in” a country… that should/might(?) be understood as identifying oneself to some sort of quest… an attempt to understand… something… in their DNA results.

Taking this back to the title of this post… the same might be said of the whole “Viking thing”… though, I think this gets complicated. About twenty years ago, I told someone about my “Viking origins”. They asked (fair question) how the DNA proved such a thing, and I responded that it was because one DNA company (over the years, I’ve tested with five, total) showed I was over (at that time) forty percent Scandinavian. They responded that just because it showed Scandinavian origins doesn’t mean that it was Viking in origin. That’s absolutely true, but… for having done genealogy for over thirty years (at that time), and having reached back in most lines to the 17th century (some even further… supported by primary source materials, of course), I had encountered not one instance of a Scandinavian surname. However, the Viking thumbprint on DNA in the British Isles, France, Germany, the Baltic, etc. (all areas indicated in my DNA origins), cannot be easily dismissed. Further, in the time since that discussion, I’ve significantly expanded my work in Y DNA studies and have seen Pretanī Y in Norway, Denmark, Sweden, and Iceland… and Scandinavian Y in the British Isles. It’s a throwback to massaging the brain for the old lessons of World History 101, but through another type of magnifying glass.

It hasn’t been measured, so I can’t show percentages, but, I think most who take DNA tests (and, by the way, per an M.I.T. study, as of 2019, an estimated 26 million had tested their DNA for ancestry… and, by the way, one in five Americans have tested their DNA.) are just trying to get a handle on their ancestral origins… maybe even trying to see if it aligns with what they already “know”. Some even test to finally “prove” Native American origins (and, in my experience, frequently fail). Anyway, I think a good many get their results, say, “cool” and then tuck them away as some sort of “mission accomplished”.

I could go on and on about this (and, I’m likely to expand on some things in future posts), but I want to move along to thoughts on an even deeper motivation.

Could this journey through DNA reflect a need to identify to a sort of lack of “tribal” connection… a personal, genetic cry for something(s) absent in ourselves and in the world, today? Walking this back to the “You’re not a Viking”… I wonder… would it be right to belittle a person, so many generations removed from their Native American roots, for trying to reconnect with the same? Why then should anyone be quick to dismiss someone else’s “journey to reconnect” with their own indigenous (indeed, Animistic) spirituality… be that Nordic, Brittonic, or otherwise… or even a blended rebirth of a combination, in a new understanding, found comforting to navigate the modern world?

*Photo (hazy as it is) of a very enjoyable dining experience I had in the Viking camp at Midgardsblot, in Borre, Norway, this past August.
When symbolism becomes part of daily living

November 25th, 2025

Imagine a black cat walking atop your fence.

What does it mean?

But wait, the title of this post might be misinterpreted. A post probably shouldn’t start with me noting this. Yet, it could be misinterpreted, and maybe that’s ok. If I wanted to keep all of this to myself, I wouldn’t be writing this post. So, let’s move on and just go with the flow…

This is MY interpretation of… interpreting… and it may or may not be that of any number of people… and that’s fine. Maybe, then, this is about embracing individual interpretation of meaning, yet accepting that someone else can see it differently… and that your interpretation works for you, while that of someone else works for them… and neither needs (hopefully) to step across that indivisible boundary that says that someone is right and someone is wrong. Maybe, sometimes, there is mutual interpretation of something. How wonderful, no?!

Now that this is out of the way… I think…

I’ve long been fascinated by symbolism in different things, especially how one symbol can be interpreted different ways to different people, both over time and at the same time. But let’s move beyond interpreting, say, a physical symbol interpreted for its cultural significance or offensiveness. What happens when we open the door to individuation of the spiritual?

I don’t think I can possibly go further on this without noting that one shouldn’t force it (or, maybe that works for some?). Just because someone sees something, is it good practice to immediately try to see if it fits in a square, circular, or whatever-shaped hole? Let’s say someone sees an Eagle flying overhead. Should they immediately take significance in it, or will it come to them as a metaphor for something a few days later? The right answer is/could be… yes.

Personally, and for whatever reason, in recent years, I’ve come to appreciate being patient. I try not to force meaning in the moment. So, getting back to that black cat…

For one, it happened a few days ago. I know her. She’s one of a couple of feral cats around my house. When I saw her walk the fence, I was amazed given 1) how fragile the fence has become in the nearly six years since I weaved it and that it didn’t snap under her, and 2) the grace with which she walked across it. I also embrace the color black, so the whole “fear of black cats” thing just doesn’t exist for me. Anyway, it happened, and, at that moment I just thought it was pretty cool.

Turn the page forward to “mind stirrings” this morning…

I often think of how to best work as a patient interpreter of spiritual meaning in symbols/happenings. Frankly, I like the image of gently projecting weightless energy in a form of a pleasant, smoke-like mist, and then how it can commingle with the energy of something else. Ultimately, in the mind’s eye, it becomes a beautiful, swirling dance of energies… two or more mists intermingling, working together for a mutually appreciated, yet-to-be-made-clear, purpose (is this part of “living in the moment?). It’s not directed as some sort of forced “manifestation”. It’s merely an encounter… me wanting the opportunity to work as a partner with, say, some form(s) of nature. Perhaps something comes of it, perhaps not. Yet, I find not (impatiently) expecting a result can lead to one, and that it is rather pleasing to the soul. I celebrate the chance to encounter other energy more than the result… but appreciate both.

I know, I know… I seem to be getting further and further from the black cat on the fence. Allow me to weave a bit more, in order to fully assemble the picture.

There’s a philosophy in modern druidry, and indeed, witchcraft…

Ugh… alright, push away any stereotypes this invokes. Clean them away, and just listen without listening to respond with something negative. I hate that I even have to brace for such a thing. Moving on…

There’s a philosophy about “hedge-riding”… and, by the way, “hedge druids” and “hedge witches”? Generally defined, solitary practitioners of a form of folk magic that focus on the liminal spaces between the physical and spiritual worlds. So, “hedge-riding” might be defined as entering an altered state of consciousness to travel to the Otherworld or… even the natural world… for guidance and messages. It can be a form of trance work… which, frankly, conjures up more stereotypes and misunderstandings. To me, it can mean conscious, semi-conscious, and even unconscious. Since I’ve gone down enough rabbit holes in this post, and get further and further from my point… I’ll leave this without further explanation at this time…

That black cat on the fence was appreciated at the moment I saw it, for what I already explained. My thoughts this morning (which I already noted as well), bounced around the ideas on “hedge-riding”, or how one can work in the liminal spaces, between the physical and spiritual worlds. In that the black cat walked on this fence, it reminded me, also, of my work within and outside the spaces around the fence. Inside the fence is my soul space… my garden… where, for hours, I can quite literally, lose myself in the time I spend tending my herbs and plants. On the outside, within about ten yards… my driveway. Symbolic of two different worlds, and a metaphor, to boot.

“Magic”, or a series of coincidences that only I’ve spun together in my imagination? Well, for one, I take my “coincidences” in Jungian form, so… not coincidences. As far as “magic” goes… I’d argue that folklore and Hollywood have built many a misunderstanding in our heads as to what magic truly is. Symbolism? Yes, for me, and it’s enough for me.

How can we both embrace and let go? How can we commingle with other things, and, indeed, people… enjoy the differences in the moment… and just walk away in celebration of the encounter? As for the spirituality in symbolism… the inferred “magic”, perhaps… maybe it’s only realized later. Maybe it’s not just a read on something we observe, but also what we realize about ourselves in the aftermath. Perhaps it also results in seeking a change in ourselves… and perhaps I’m going down yet another rabbit hole. 😉

*Yes, that’s an image of the wattle fence I made nearly six years ago.

Category: spiritual symbolism

The Lime/Linden Tree – a “lesser” tree in the eyes of Ancient Britons?

“You’re not a Viking”- a problem with too quickly belittling identity in ancestral DNA

When symbolism becomes part of daily living