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The rowans ( or ) or mountain-ashes are shrubs or trees in the genus Sorbus of the rose family, Rosaceae. They are native throughout the cool temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere, with the highest species diversity in the Himalaya, southern Tibet and parts of western China, where numerous apomictic microspecies occur.Rushforth, K. (1999). Trees of Britain and Europe. Collins . The name rowan was originally applied to the species Sorbus aucuparia and is also used for other species in the genus Sorbus.McAllister, H.A. 2005. The genus Sorbus: Mountain Ash and other Rowans . Kew Publishing.
Natural hybrids, often including S. aucuparia and the whitebeam, Aria edulis (syn. Sorbus aria), give rise to many endemic variants in the UK.
The traditional name rowan was applied to the species Sorbus aucuparia. The name "rowan" is recorded from 1804, detached from an earlier rowan-tree, rountree, attested from the 1540s in northern dialects of English and Scots language. It is often thought to be from a North Germanic source, perhaps related to Old Norse reynir (cf. Norwegian rogn, Danish røn, Swedish rönn), ultimately from the Common Germanic verb *raud-inan "to redden", in reference to the berries (as is the Latin name sorbus). Various dialectal variants of rowan are found in English, including ran, roan, rodan, royan, royne, round, and rune.
The Old English name of the rowan is cwic-beám, which survives in the name quickbeam (also quicken, quicken-tree, and variants). This name by the 19th century was reinterpreted as connected to the word witch, from a dialectal variant wick for quick and names such as wicken-tree, wich-tree, wicky, and wiggan-tree, giving rise to names such as witch-hazel"Witch-hazel" is much more commonly associated with Hamamelis. and witch-tree.Abram Smythe Palmer, Folk-etymology: a Dictionary of Verbal Corruptions Or Words Perverted in Form Or Meaning, by False Derivation Or Mistaken Analogy (1882), 443f.
The tree has two names in Welsh language, cerdinen and criafol. Criafol may be translated as "The Lamenting Fruit", likely derived from the Welsh tradition that the Christian cross was carved from the wood of this tree, and the subsequent association of the Rowan's red fruit with the blood of Christ.
The Old Irish name is cairtheand, reflected in Modern Irish caorthann. The "arboreal" Bríatharogam in the Book of Ballymote associates the rowan with the letter luis, with the gloss "delightful to the eye ( li sula) is luis, i.e. rowan ( caertheand), owing to the beauty of its berries". Due to this, "delight of the eye" (vel sim.) has been reported as a "name of the rowan" by some commentators.
The most common Scots Gaelic name is caorann (), which appears in numerous Highland place names such as Beinn a' Chaorainn and Loch a’ Chaorainn. Rowan was also the clan badge of the Malcolms and McLachlans. There were strong taboos in the Highlands against the use of any parts of the tree save the berries, except for ritual purposes. For example, a Gaelic threshing tool made of rowan and called a buaitean was used on grain meant for rituals and celebrations.
In the Canadian provinces of Newfoundland and Labrador and Nova Scotia, this species is commonly referred to as a "dogberry" tree.Story, G. M. and Kirwin, W. J. (1990). Dictionary of Newfoundland English. University of Toronto Press. . In German language, Sorbus aucuparia is known as the Vogelbeerbaum ("bird-berry tree") or as Eberesche. The latter is a compound of the name of the ash tree ( Esche) with what is contemporarily the name of the boar ( Eber), but in fact the continuation of a Gaulish name, eburo- (also the name for a dark reddish-brown colour, cognate with Greek orphnos, Old Norse iarpr "brown"); like sorbus, eburo- seems to have referred to the colour of the berries; it is also recorded as a Gaulish name for the yew (which also has red berries), see also Eburodunum (disambiguation).
Rowan is used as a food plant by the of some Lepidoptera species.
The best-known species is the European rowan Sorbus aucuparia, a small tree typically tall growing in a variety of habitats throughout northern Europe and in mountains in southern Europe and southwest Asia. Its berries are a favourite food for many birds and are a traditional wild-collected food in Britain and Scandinavia. It is one of the hardiest European trees, occurring to 71° north in Vardø Municipality in the far northern part of Arctic Norway, and has also become widely naturalised in northern North America.
The greatest diversity of form as well as the largest number of rowan species is in Asia, with very distinctive species such as Sargent's rowan Sorbus sargentiana with large leaves long and broad and very large corymbs with 200–500 flowers, and at the other extreme, small-leaf rowan Sorbus microphylla with leaves long and broad. While most are trees, the dwarf rowan Sorbus reducta is a low shrub to tall. Several of the Asian species are widely cultivated as ornamental trees.
North American native species in the genus Sorbus include the American mountain-ash Sorbus americana and Showy mountain-ash Sorbus decora in the east and Sitka mountain-ash Sorbus sitchensis in the west.
Numerous hybrids, mostly behaving as true species reproducing by apomixis, occur between rowans and whitebeams; these are variably intermediate between their parents but generally more resemble whitebeams and are usually grouped with them (q.v.).
The wood is dense and used for carving and Woodturning and for tool handles and walking sticks.Vedel, H., & Lange, J. (1960). Trees and Bushes in Wood and Hedgerow. Metheun & Co. Ltd., London. Rowan fruit are a traditional source of for vegetable dyes. In Finland, it has been a traditional wood of choice for horse sled shafts and rake spikes. in Norway with visible heartwood]]
The fruit of European rowan ( Sorbus aucuparia) can be made into a slightly bitter jelly which in Britain is traditionally eaten as an accompaniment to game, and into jams and other preserves either on their own or with other fruit. The fruit can also be a substitute for coffee beans, and has many uses in alcoholic beverages: to flavour liqueurs and cordials, to produce country wine, and to flavour ale. In Austria a clear rowan schnapps is distilled which is called by its German name Vogelbeerschnaps, Czechs also make a rowan liquor called jeřabinka, the Polish Jarzębiak is rowan-flavoured vodka, and the Welsh used to make a rowan wine called diodgriafel.
Rowan with superior fruit for human food use are available but not common; mostly the fruits are gathered from wild trees growing on public lands.
Rowan fruit contains sorbic acid, and when raw also contains parasorbic acid (about 0.4%–0.7% in the European rowan), which causes indigestion and can lead to kidney damage, but heat treatment (cooking, heat-drying etc.) and, to a lesser extent, freezing, renders it nontoxic by changing it to the benign sorbic acid. They are also usually too astringent to be palatable when raw. Collecting them after first frost (or putting in the freezer) cuts down on the bitter taste as well.
In Norse mythology, the goddess Sif is the wife of the thunder god Thor, who has been linked with Ravdna. According to Skáldskaparmál the rowan is called "the salvation of Thor" because Thor once saved himself by clinging to it. It has been hypothesized that Sif was once conceived in the form of a rowan to which Thor clung.
In the Fianna Cycle of Irish mythology, The Pursuit of Diarmuid and Grainne sees the couple eloping, trying to escape the vengeance of the legendary leader Fionn Mac Cumhaill, whom Grainne had spurned. The pair came to a forest guarded by the giant Searbhán. Searbhán allowed the pair to rest and hunt in his forest, as long as they did not eat the berries of his magical rowan tree. The pregnant Grainne desired the berries, and Diarmuid was compelled to kill Searbhán to obtain them. His mortal weapons being powerless against Searbhán, he used the giant's own iron club to kill him. The pair climbed high into the rowan tree to eat the sweetest berries, then rested in the tree afterwards. This was in violation of the advice of Aengus, the god of love, who had warned the couple that they should "not sleep in a cave with one opening, or a house with one door, or a tree with one branch, and that they would never be able to eat where they cooked, or sleep where they ate." Fionn Mac Cuimhaill tracked the couple to the rowan tree and tricked Diarmuid into revealing himself through a game of chess. Aengus spirited Grainne away and Diarmuid leapt to safety, and the pursuit continued.
British folklorists of the Victorian era reported the folk belief in apotropaic powers of the rowan-tree, in particular in the warding off of witches. Such a report is given by Edwin Lees (1856) for the Wyre Forest in the English West Midlands. Sir James Frazer (1890) reported such a tradition in Scotland, where the tree was often planted near a gate or front door.
According to Frazer, birds' droppings often contain rowan seeds, and if such droppings land in a fork or hole where old leaves have accumulated on a larger tree, such as an oak or a maple, they may result in a rowan growing as an epiphyte on the larger tree. Such a rowan is called a "flying rowan" and was thought of as especially potent against witches and black magic, and as a counter-charm against sorcery. In 1891, Charles Godfrey Leland also reported traditions of rowan's apotropaic powers against witches in English folklore, citing the Denham Tracts (collected between 1846 and 1859). Rowan also serves as protection against fairies. For example, according to Thomas Keightley mortals could safely witness fairy rades (mounted processions held by the fairies each year at the onset of summer) by placing a rowan branch over their doors.
However, as fruit production for a given summer is related to weather conditions the previous summer, with warm, dry summers increasing the amount of stored sugars available for subsequent flower and fruit production, it has no predictive relationship to the weather of the next winter.
In Malax, Finland, the reverse was thought. If the rowan flowers were plentiful then the rye harvest would also be plentiful. Similarly, if the rowan flowered twice in a year there would be many potatoes and many weddings that autumn. And in Sipoo people are noted as having said that winter had begun when the waxwings ( Bombycilla garrulus) had eaten the last of the rowan fruit.
In Sweden, it was also thought that if the rowan trees grew pale and lost colour, the autumn and winter would bring much illness.
J. R. R. Tolkien's novel The Two Towers employs rowans as the signature tree for the Ent, Quickbeam. The forest of Treebeard, where Quickbeam and other Ents live, is populated with numerous rowans that were said to have been planted by male Ents to please the female Entwives. Quickbeam declares his fondness for the tree by saying that no other "people of the Rose ... are so beautiful to me," a reference to the rowan's membership in the family Rosaceae.
Carl-Herman Tillhagen (1995). 917798918X, Carlssons bokförlag. 917798918X
Popular culture
References to the rowan fruit's red color and the flowers' beauty are common in Celtic music. For example, the song "Marie's Wedding" contains the verse
See also
Explanatory footnotes
External links
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