Post by Cameronian on Sept 18, 2003 19:41:17 GMT -6
This letter was posted in to the Correspondence section of the Celtic Magazine in 1881 by a John Cameron from Sunderland....
THE SCOTTISH THISTLE.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE CELTIC MAGAZINE.
Sir, With respect to the interesting legend of the origin of the thistle as the National Emblem of Scotland, it may interest your the readers to have the historical facts as far as I have been able to gather them.
The melancholy thistles Carduus heterophyllus— was the badge of James the First of Scotland (the first of that name who ruled that kingdom), a most appropriate emblem for that unfortunate family; but yet it had no connection with their history, but was derived from the belief that a decoction of this plant was a sovereign remedy for madness, which in olden times was called “melancholy.”
The true Scottish Thistle is the cotton thistle—Onopordon Acanthiurn. Achaius King of Scotland (in the latter part of the eighth century) is said to have been the first to have adopted the thistle for his device. Favine, the historian, says that Achaius assumed the thistle in combination with the rue — the thistle because it will not endure handling and the rue because it would drive away serpents by its smell, and by curing it’s poisonous bites by its juice.
The thistle was not received into the National Arms before the middle of the fifteenth century.—I am, &c.,
John Cameron
Sunderland Oct 4, 1881
THE SCOTTISH THISTLE.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE CELTIC MAGAZINE.
Sir, With respect to the interesting legend of the origin of the thistle as the National Emblem of Scotland, it may interest your the readers to have the historical facts as far as I have been able to gather them.
The melancholy thistles Carduus heterophyllus— was the badge of James the First of Scotland (the first of that name who ruled that kingdom), a most appropriate emblem for that unfortunate family; but yet it had no connection with their history, but was derived from the belief that a decoction of this plant was a sovereign remedy for madness, which in olden times was called “melancholy.”
The true Scottish Thistle is the cotton thistle—Onopordon Acanthiurn. Achaius King of Scotland (in the latter part of the eighth century) is said to have been the first to have adopted the thistle for his device. Favine, the historian, says that Achaius assumed the thistle in combination with the rue — the thistle because it will not endure handling and the rue because it would drive away serpents by its smell, and by curing it’s poisonous bites by its juice.
The thistle was not received into the National Arms before the middle of the fifteenth century.—I am, &c.,
John Cameron
Sunderland Oct 4, 1881
