& shades of green in-between
In an act of sun worship, the seedheads of wild clematis (Clematis vitalba) inflate themselves from the bedraggled feathers of rainy days to captivating clouds of fluffy illumination, magnifying the solar magic of winter rays. Their ethereal, sunlit beauty bedecks the trees and hedgerows of countryside paths and trackways, embodying the name bestowed by herbalist John Gerard in the 16th century: ‘traveller’s joy’.
This very name was taught to the young Constance Spry some three hundred years later. According to Spry biographer Sue Shepherd, the elderly Derbyshire countrywoman employed as her nursemaid would share the folk language of countryside flowers on walks. Spry would go on to include wild clematis seedheads in her imaginative and groundbreaking floral arrangements, drawing such attention that the police once arrived to control the crowd flocking to a Bond Street perfumery window display.
Originally native to the south of England, and favouring alkaline soil, C. vitalba has now spread via introduction as far as southern Scotland. A vigorous deciduous climber, its profusion of small, creamy-white summer flowers are pollinated by hoverflies and bees. The buds sustain caterpillars of several native moth species, including Haworth’s Pug (Eupithecia haworthiata). Seeds are a source of nutrition for goldfinch and greenfinch, and the plant provides shelter and nesting material for birds. C. vitabla goes by a plethora of traditional epithets. ‘Smokewood’, for example, refers to the sections of porous stem that would be broken off and smoked like cigars by swaggering boys.
The RHS website lists many common names, starting with ‘beggar’s plant’, which mirrors the popular french term ‘herbe aux gueux’ or beggar’s weed. Paupers and vagrants were said to have made use of the irritant sap, rubbing it on the skin to create an ulcerous appearance that elicited charity from passing benefactors. Common names for wild clematis embody the extremes of subjective human perception, from ‘love’ to ‘devil’s twine’. The latter seems particularly pertinent to the ecological challenge faced in New Zealand, where the invasive C. vitalba, having no natural predators, has become a serious threat to the existence of many New Zealand native forest plants.
Writing in Country Life magazine in 1949, horticulturalist Arthur Hellyer took issue with the synonym ‘Virgin’s bower’, a reference to a German legend that the wild clematis canopy provided a haven for Mary, Joseph, and the infant Jesus on their flight to Egypt. Hellyer declared the moniker “an artificial creation which has never passed into everyday usage”. Equally, Hellyer was not satisfied with the more commonly applied name ‘old man’s beard’, which like ‘grandfather’s whiskers’ and ‘hedge feathers’, alludes only to the fluffy silver appearance of seedheads, and precludes the delightful summer flowers. Hellyer left readers in little doubt as to his firmly favoured name for our native wild clematis:
Traveller’s Joy is just right, whether the plants are in flower or in seed, for few plants are more calculated to catch and delight the eye of the wayfarer.
