What is barrenwort?
By Chelsie Vandaveer
April 7, 2003
In 1597, John Gerard wrote, "This rare and strange plant was sent to me from the French Kings Herbarist Robinus, dwelling in Paris at the signe of the blacke head, in the street called Du bout du Monde, in English, The end of the world. This herbe I planted in my garden, & in the beginning of May it came forth of the ground, with small, hard & woodie crooked stalks: whereupon grow rough & sharpe pointed leaves....
"Upon the same stalks come forth small floures, consisting of foure leaves, whose outsides are purple, the edges on the inner side red,
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A Girl and Her Duenna, c. 1670
by Bartolome Esteban Murillo
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the bottome yellow, & the middle part of a bright red colour, and the whole floure somewhat hollow." (The Herbal or General Historie of Plants, 1633 edition)
Thomas Johnson added in 1633 that the plant "groweth in the moist medowes of Italie about Bononia and Vincentia: it growth in the garden of my friend, Mr. John Milion in Old-street, and some other gardens about towne."
The plant described by Gerard is Epimedium alpinum Linnaeus. Long before Linnaeus made the name 'official', Gerard wrote, "It is called Epimedium." The name appears derived from the ancient Greek, epimedion. The meaning of the name is unknown; no one is even certain that the Epimedium of the Middle Ages and the Greek epimedion were the same.
The plant was apparently used by women in southern Europe. Gerard noted, "I have thought good to call it Barrenwoort in English...because (as some authors affirme) being drunke it is an enemie to conception."
The Faculty of Forestry at the University of Zagreb has posted a great photograph of Epimedium alpinum. To view the photograph, click on the link:
http://hrast.sumfak.hr/~botanika/projekt01063/eng/d058a.htm
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