A Peaceful Scene...
The Common Buttercup
Although this looks a peaceful scene... with flowers there is always the reminder of death. The common meadow buttercup which once enlivened the English patchwork landscape has been largely beaten back by the might and waste of the European Common Agricultural Policy's grant system. Agri-experts, advisors, government ministers, commercial lobbyists, increasingly poor farmers never learn... modern efficient farming has to be good - the traditional way bad and to be wiped out.
This image was typical of the field surrounding our small house in west Wales. It was teeming with life... as witnessed frequently when our pussy cat Jo-Jo sprang fox-like, high into the air, to pounce down almost on the same spot where she waited for a mouse to appear... and in a completely different way, but equally graceful, were the creamy-white owls from our disused barn who swooped silently on the mice who escaped our cat's claws.
The common buttercup, Upright Meadow Crowfoot Ranunculus acris, is distinguished by a peculiar acridity and can blister and inflame when touched. Of course when buttercups were common in farmer's fields they were scythed with the various swards and dried for hay... and on drying lost all their harmful potent. In it's fresh state cattle dislike it... although hardy creatures their tender mouths blister on chewing it - and all for no nutritional value.
As children we used to think that buttercups made butter yellow... and when you held one under your chin the reflected golden glow indicated radiant health. We couldn't pick buttercups without picking daisies at the same time, and many a garland or necklace was made and worn as decoration.
Other older and now not-so-common names for the Meadow Crowfoot were kingcups, goldcups and butter flowers of John Gay (1685-1732) and other poets. Gay associates the butter flower with rosemary [which I put in Jo-Jo's garden grave] in his description of a rustic funeral...
"To show their love, the neighbours far and near
Followed with wistful looks the damsel's bier;
Sprigged rosemary the lads and lasses bore,
While dismally the parson walked before.
Upon her grave the rosemary they threw,
The daisy, butter flower, and endive blue."
In France the old name for buttercup is grenouillette a name similar in meaning to the generic Latin name Ranunculus and referring to the moist meadow land in which the plant flourishes if left to be. In French grenouille means frog... a name which used to be applied particularly to Parisians from the marshy lands which the city originally occupied... thus making the English slur not very original to say the least.
The image of our old field of buttercups reminds me of how the streets of London will be today... flowered... peaceful... but with the reminder of death.
8:44:47 PM 
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