Thursday, December 5, 2019

AoA for John Yarrowe

John

Given the recipient's name, it was so obvious what I needed to do -- find a medieval MS with yarrow in it and make a page that looked like it could've come from a medicinal. I found a variety of MSs, but liked the best this De Materia Medica image of yarrow from a 10th C Turkish MS.

The text on the left reads:

Achilleos sive yarrow, alias dictam vulgariter gearwe, est herbiferum flos ad solantem spirituum et animorum.

Which translates to:

Achilleos or yarrow, otherwise commonly called gearwe [the Anglo-Saxon name of the plant] is an herbaceous flower for the soothing of spirits.

The right-hand side was intended to read as if it were a translation or gloss of the Latin, but without being a translation:

Yarrowe, otherwise commonly known as John, soothes the spirits of all and is now named a lord of our court.

I'm exceptionally pleased with the calligraphy which I did freehand without even drawing any lines. I feel like I've finally figured out how to write rather than the draw.


© 2019, Sara L. Uckelman.