Any info about the green man?

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Nerd
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 07:57 AM

Les, you may confidently declare that the "small collection of green men" you speak of are of "relatively recent origin," but in fact you don't know when they originated, because nobody knows. What we do know is that they were well-enough known by 1578 that one could instruct a company of players simply to "dress like green men" and they would know what to do.

You may add a hundred exclamation points after "Germany," but in so doing you reveal only your own parochialism. Neither the foliate head nor the combatant green man are native English traditions; both seem to be pan-European. Therefore, evidence about the origin and development of both the foliate head and the combatant Green Man tradition, and of connections between those traditions, may be (indeed must be) legitimately looked for outside of England.

Finally, you may pooh-pooh all this evidence as completely inconsequential and unworthy of consideration. In so doing you claim that you know more than the editors of the journal Folklore, who thought the article revealed enough new evidence to be worthy of publication. I know the editors of Folklore, and have published a paper there myself. They and their reviewers are pretty tough.

Finally, I've read the paper, and I find the evidence interesting myself. I don't know if you've bothered to read it or not. If so, of course you may disagree. But I find the tone of "is that it?" rather combative, as though you have something invested in the belief that there is no connection between these traditions.

I will repeat my position from above, and you can see if you really find it all that objectionable:

I think this connection is rather tenuous for suggesting that the two figures were always and everywhere equated...but it does show that as early as the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and possibly even the early 14th, SOME people thought of the whiffer figure and the foliate head as connected. Since the whiffer figure was in some times and places called "The Green Man," and since the Green Man as a pub sign did come from this figure, there was already a web of connections among all the meanings of Green Man, including the foliate head, in the late middle ages and Renaissance. The idea did not originate with Lady Raglan. She merely was the first to directly apply the name "Green Man" to the foliate head and have it recorded for posterity.

It is possible, of course, that many people in olden times did NOT perceive a connection among these figures, but this is the kind of thing that tends not to leave much evidence.

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Nerd
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 11:11 AM

Insane Beard,

It was Lady Raglan who first called the Ecclesiastical Foliate Heads after the Green Men / Man of folklore, pub names included - this amounts to a fairly significant coining, I'd say.

Sorry, but this is not what "coining" means. To apply an existing word or phrase to a similar but different referent is not the same thing as coining the term. It may seem pedantic to point his out, but I think the difference is significant here because to say Raglan "coined the term" suggests that human figures covered in leaves had never been called "green man" before 1931, eliminating the possibility that the phrase was part of medieval or renaissance consciousness. In fact, we now know that the phrase was certainly part of renaissance consciousness, and quite likely part of medieval consciousness too, and that it referred to a human figure covered in leaves. This in turn suggests that all those thousands of people who saw what you call (but they did not call) "ecclesiastical foliate heads," might very well have said, "hmmm...that's kind of like a green man."

As for the rest, I appreciate what you're saying, and absolutely agree that "profound afflicting horror" is sometimes represented in foliate heads. But not always. Traditional symbols, especially ones that persist over time, are always polysemic. Artists are able to express many ideas using variations on traditional symbols.

It's sort of like asking what rabbits meant in the middle ages. Did they mean fertility? Yes. Rampant and perhaps sinful sexuality? Yes. Timidity and cowardice? Yes. Speed? Yes. Succulence and good eating? certainly.

Fecundity or fertility, I would say, is always part of the meaning of the foliate head. Sometimes, this fecundity is seen as sinful, evil, and a prelude to suffering. Certainly the sexual aspects of fecundity were strongly regulated by the church, so it makes sense that this attitude would be expressed there.

But it would be a mistake to assume that the Church was entirely against fecundity, and an even bigger mistake to assume that every stonecarver who ever carved a grotesque or a roof-boss was told by an ecclesiastical authority precisely what to carve and how.

Because churches did not always object to fecundity, and because carvers often put their own spin on things anyway, there are in fact foliate heads that look quite jolly. There are also ones that look threatening, ones that look fierce, and ones that look silly.

So, foliate heads. Fertility? Yes. Sin? Yes. Suffering? yes. Nature? Yes. Fearsome strength and power? Yes.

As to whether stonecarving in churches is folklore...nowadays it is certainly treated as such, and the film on cathedral stonecarvers that won the Oscar for documentary short in 1985 was directed by a folklorist. So whether this is a "non-folklore setting" is open to debate.

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 12:00 PM

I have read these threads a number of ties and I think I have a reasonable grasp of the stone heads in churches - they are part of church stone work.

I have to say I have no real understanding of 'Green man'.Perhaps Nerd you could help with this point?

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 02:16 PM

The Usenet group alt.folklore.urban used to maintain a voluminous FAQ documenting or debunking the various bits of quasi-folkloric trivia that came through the group. The FAQ was (probably still is) in the form of one-line assertions prefixed 'T' and 'F' (plus some elaborations like 'U' for 'unknown' and 'Tb'/'Fb' for stories *believed* to be true or false but not proven). This kind of thing:

F. The songs in _The Wicker Man_ are all Ancient Traditional Music.
T. Smoe of the music is.

It's quite a good device for sorting out your thoughts on a subject.

Splitting the difference between IB and Nerd, I suggest:

F. The title 'green man' is a modern invention.
T. Figures dressed in green and/or in leaves have been called 'green men' for a very long time.
F. All foliate heads are representations of 'the Green Man'.
T. Some 'green men' have been depicted in conjunction with foliate heads, suggesting an association between the two.
Tb. The idea of a (singular) Green Man is a modern invention.

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 02:24 PM

Interesting Phil,

but those hards in churches and Jack in the Green are easy to identify, describe and so on. the Green Man does not seem to be. It seems to be a mobile feast

Cheers

Les

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 04:10 PM

Nerd, Les, Phil et al - lovely stuff - keep it coming...

Some 'green men' have been depicted in conjunction with foliate heads

Wild men I'd say...

Wild Man, Misericord, Ripon Cathedral

Disgorging Foliate Head (non-human? inverted!), Misericord, Ripon Cathedral

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Nerd
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 04:26 PM

Pip has it about right there.

I can try to clarify the Green Man a bit, but I recommend you either get a hard copy of the journal article:

The Name of the Green Man
Brandon S. Centerwall
Folklore, Vol. 108, (1997), pp. 25-33

Or, get yourself to a Library with a subscription to JSTOR and look up the article there. In either case, you'll get to see the pictures, which make it easier to visualize.

To a certain extent you're right that it's a moveable feast. The name "Green Man" has been applied to different figures over the years.

Here goes:

The term "Green Man" has been used since at least the middle 16th century to refer to a man, usually bearded, covered in leaves, and carrying weapons, who functions as part of ritual drama. The functions of the green man in this context seem to have been mock combat and the clearing of space (similar to the whiffer or whiffler and to the "roomer" of traditional mumming). There doesn't necessarily have to be a seasonal meaning, although many of the enactments at which green men performed were themselves annual events held at the same time each year, and it's relatively likely that they derive in some part from seasonal observances. Also, while we only have the name "Green Man" recorded from about 1578 in England, the figure of a hairy man covered in leaves was around long before that. We cannot confirm when he began to be called "green man."

A good visual representation of this kind of "Green Man" would be the so-called Wild Man Finial, which is one of a matched pair belonging to the Cloisters museum in New York.

In the early seventeenth century, we get the first appearance of the "green man and still," an emblem for various distilleries in England. Interestingly, most dictionaries of phrases get this entirely wrong, and claim that the "green man" of the "green man and still" is an herbalist or greengrocer, who provides the herbs made into liquors (such as the juniper for gin, etc.) This is clearly wrong if you look at the early emblem, and the early references to the emblem. The "Green Man" of the early emblem looks exactly like the green man of the pageants, or indeed the wild man finial I linked to above: a bearded man carrying a club and covered in leaves. I can't find a picture to link to but there is one in the article. An early reference to these Green Men in the distilling trade (1680?) says the following:

"They are called woudmen, or wildmen, thou' at thes day we in ye signe [trade] call them Green Men, couered with grene boues: and are used for singes by stiflers of strong watters ... and a fit emblem for those that use that intosticating licker which berefts them of their sennes"

(By the way, anyone who wants to argue that the connection between "The Wild Man," "The Wodewose" and "The Green Man" is a modern invention will be interested to see that it too goes back this far.)

Because the Green Man had become an emblem of liquor (in at least some people's minds because liquor made one wild), it also became associated with inns and pubs where one could drink liquor. Hence the "Green Man and Still" and finally "The Green Man" as traditional names for pubs and inns, still common in the 1930s when Raglan was writing. (The Green Man and Still was a well-known pub in Oxford Street, London, by the way.)

Once again, the direct connections that have been shown between "foliate heads" and "Combatant Green Men," (what I've been describing in this post), are threefold: the bench-end showing two combatant green men emerging from the ears of a foliate head (1534), an engraving showing a combatant green man whose shield is a foliate head (1450), and a combatant green man whose head is a foliate head (1308).

Does this help at all?

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: akenaton
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 04:37 PM

I have always assumed that the "green man" represented the force or spirit of nature. Perhaps the leaved figure is in fact a representation of that force?
I first encountered a reference in the song, "Gartan mothers lullaby"

Where the "green man's thorn" (gorse or whin), "is wreathed in rings of fog"
There are other references to various Pagan spirits in the song.

I live in an area where in the very early morning the misty wreaths do walk among the whins all of which are decorated by cobwebs glistening with condensation......Ake

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 05:28 PM

As Bill Clinton nearly said, it all depends what the meaning of 'the' is. There's 'the green man' as in 'the conventional figure of a wild man or man of the woods'. Then there's 'The Green Man', a singular personification of the natural world, who our forebears are thought to have actually believed in.

Am I right in thinking that whether the green man had any association with foliate heads is a separate question from whether The Green Man did?

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Nerd
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 05:48 PM

Insane Beard:

Indeed, and as we've seen, by the 1600s "wild man" and "green man" were interchangeable terms, applied to the exact same figure. When this came to be the case we have no way of knowing. What the carver of what you call a "Wild Man" at Ripon called his creation, I suspect, is equally unknown, so we may choose to call it "wild man" or "green man." But the point is that the connection between this figure (called "Green Man" by the 1570s and maybe before) and foliate heads (whose medieval name, if any, we do not know) was made in the middle ages, not in the 1930s.

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 06:47 PM

But the point is that the connection between this figure (called "Green Man" by the 1570s and maybe before) and foliate heads (whose medieval name, if any, we do not know) was made in the middle ages, not in the 1930s.

I disagree. The Green Man / Wildman is a very different creature from the foliate head. Those few Foliate Heads shown with bodies, certainly aren't in any way wild or green. It is precisely the otherwise normal nature of the heads depicted as being foliate (both disgorging or otherwise) that makes them so compelling.

Norwich Cathedral, Cloister

Southwell Minster, Misericord

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 07:10 PM

The figure disgorging the greenery can be traced back to the Biblical story of Seth and the seeds - mentioned in the other Green Man thread that's knocking around here, so that at least is in place in a church (note - most of our cathedrals were built before 1534 so were all Catholic - til Henry VIII "invented" the Anglican church, so to call it 'Norwich Anglican Cathedral' when it was rebuilt between 1297 and 1430, is erroneous).

LTS

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Nerd
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 07:56 PM

Insane Beard,

I'm not sure we actually disagree. I did not say that they were the same figure, and I certainly never said they were always the same figure, so foliate heads with bodies that aren't covered in leaves don't contradict what I'm saying. Obviously, one of the remarkable things about the "green man/wild man" figure is that he almost never has a foliate head--so obviously, even if there is some overlap between the figures, the overlap was the exception and not the rule.

I have pretty consistently spoken about a "connection" between "two traditions." This does not contradict your statement that "The Green Man / Wildman is a very different creature from the foliate head."

What I have said is that the connection was made in the middle ages between two traditions, that of the foliate head, and that of the combatant, wild, leaf-clad figure. The latter figure was certainly known as "green man" by 1578, and probably considerably earlier. So, there has been a web of connections among all the contemporary items we call "green man" that stretches back into the past, probably about as far as the name "Green Man" itself. These connections did not originate in 1939, or with neo-pagans, although they were repopularized on those two occasions.

Again: the two traditions are associated from an early date, and probably share some of the same meanings, but are not the same thing.

To go back to the symbol of the rabbit, I can offer the following analogy: rabbits and deer. In medieval iconography, they are often shown together. They share some meanings (speed, quarry to be hunted, cowardice). They do not share other meanings (Harts are symbols of love and of the "heart of the matter" (heart/hart). Rabbits are symbols of female sexuality (coney). So, these are two symbols that are associated from an early date, for pretty common-sense reasons (both are tasty woodland creatures), but they are not the same.

I think there are good, common-sense reasons to associate the green man and the foliate head (both are made up of human body parts and leaves), and I see evidence that they were in fact associated in the middle ages. I don't think that means they are the same thing.

This is different from Lady Raglan's claim, which was that they ARE the same thing. And it's also different from Centerwell's, which is that they both were CALLED "green man" in the middle ages.

Raglan's claim was over-generalized, a trait she shared with her whole era of romantic scholarship.

Centerwell's strikes me as overly speculative. We don't know what the "foliate head" was called in English in the Middle ages, and it doesn't make much difference to me, either way.

But what both Raglan and Centerwell seem to have realized is that there was a longstanding connection between these two different figures.

Does this clarify my position at all?

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 01:40 AM

So, do I have this right? 'The Green Man' and the foliate heads were around at the same time around 15 / 16 C. they are not the same thing but they do look alike.

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 02:25 AM

OK, I have read:

The name of the Green Man
by Brandon S. Centerwall

and he seems to argue that their is enough evidence to connect the foliate heads with the Green Man of plays and pageants. I do not have the academic background to judge how sound this conclusion is.

Since their are so many foliate heads in churches it is tempting to conclude that some foliate heads are bound, by chance, to look like something or other.

If the foliate heads came out of the churches and into the plays what does it suggest? Anything or nothing?

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 02:28 AM

Sory, I should have given my source:

The name of the Green Man
Folklore, Annual, 1997 by Brandon S. Centerwall

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 02:31 AM

Which comes from a link provided by Sean in the other thread:

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2386/is_v108/ai_20438232?tag=artBody;col1


http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2386/is_v108/ai_20438232?tag=artBody;col1

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: GUEST,glueman
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 02:34 AM

Green men, Jack-in-the-Green, Wildmen have a history which is summed up by Sir Gawain's adversary: a magical figure, cosmic joker, riddler. He has something in common with Mediterranean quizzical myths and, purely imho, representations of Jesus from the gospels.

I think foliate heads are a more immediate figure, possibly Liz's Seth and the Beans that have fallen from common knowledge, on the basis that diverse church builders are unlikely to popularise paganism (or whatever the contemporary equivalent was) and Devils are shown differently.
There is a tradition of metaphorical heads in the medieval period showing toothache, migraine, lust, plenty, etc., which have no bearing on Rome's teaching and may be have local significance but no dominant transferable motif other than the foliate heads.

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 06:10 AM

so to call it 'Norwich Anglican Cathedral' when it was rebuilt between 1297 and 1430, is erroneous

LTS - I call it Norwich Anglican Cathedral to differentiate it from the Norwich Roman Catholic Cathedral. My belief is that the Foliate Heads known as Green Men (or rather The Green Man!) are an integral aspect of the culture & theology of Pre-Reformation Roman Catholicism which, as you say, built the cathedrals in the first place. I am alarmed by the Anglican proclivity to promote the Foliate Heads as being pagan, though at Gloucester Cathedral there is a charming leaflet pointing out that this is most certainly not the case.

I visited the Norwich Roman Catholic Cathedral (consecrated 1873!) for the first time back in June as was delighted to find a plethora of fine Foliate Heads throughout.

Norwich Roman Catholic Cathedral, Column Base

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: manitas_at_work
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 06:27 AM

For a long time after the Reformation, Catholicism was labelled as pagan by Protestants and almost certainly still is in some quarters!

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: GUEST,LTS pretending to work
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 06:54 AM

"To go back to the symbol of the rabbit, I can offer the following analogy: rabbits and deer. In medieval iconography, they are often shown together."

Rabbits were introduced along with a lot of other things, by the Romans, but they didn't roam wild about the country until much later than the mediaeval images mentioned. The 'rabbit and deer' image is more likely to be the hare and hart.

LTS

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 07:20 AM

It seems a fair assumption that nobody would mess with the early church by putting pagan symbols in the walls.

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 12:32 PM

My feelings entirely, Les - but the other problem comes in trying to establish any sort of clear pre-Christian precedent for who the pagans think their Green Man might be. There is a famous example in which an exquisite foliate head is daubed with the graffiti SYVANUS; many assume the carving & the graffiti to be contemporary, but the disparity of execution is quite remarkable, rather like the pre-historic cup-and-ring carvings in the Rothbury Hills upon which someone has inscribed the legend 'Rock Map'. The book worth looking at here is Marcia MacDermott's Explore Green Men (Heart of Albion), hardly the most promising of titles, and some of the other books in the Heart of Albion Explore series have been panned, but this one is perhaps the clearest work to date on the Green Man / Foliate Heads, especially given the plethora of bogus pagan / folkloric studies currently on the market. A recent book, self-published, attempts to prove that all Foliate Heads derive from The Legend of the Rood, discussed here and on the other thread. This is interesting, but in terms of iconographic consistency it falls at the first fence given the sheer diversity of physiognomy on offer even in the most naturalistic of carvings, as well as the paucity of triple disgorgers, but as pet-theories go it's interesting, and the only one so-far that attempts to account for The Green Man (so-called) in a Christian context.

I might add that only culturally I am a Christian, but only in the sense of Christ being the first Communist, as I was brought up to believe. To me, the Foliate Heads are a manifestation of the socio-psycho dichotomy of Material Dialectics, the Nature-Nurture Debate & a generally Marxist overview of human struggle in general. This essentially dualistic view of things, whilst heretical in the middle-ages (Gnosticism) is remarkably entrenched into the theology of the time in which nature, particularly human nature, was increasingly seen as the work of the devil. Contradictions abound of course, such as Hildegard of Bingen's concept of Viriditas, but none of Foliate Heads would appear to embody this transcendental spirituality...

Enough! We're off to Lymm! See you there??

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Nerd
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 02:06 AM

Liz,

Good point. Rabbits were, as you say, introduced to England by the Romans and again by the Normans in the 12th century. Rabbits were being bred for eating in England by the 1220s, their skins were a profitable enterprise there by 1305, and in 1555 a Swiss naturalist wrote: "There are few countries wherein coneys do not breed, but the most plenty of all is in England." Depending on when in the period we are talking about, rabbits may or may not have been running wild in England.

Whether they were or no, rabbits still were well known to the English. Many English people traveled to the continent, and many read--primarily, of course, in French and Latin. To many English people rabbits would always have had the meanings I was talking about, just as lions were understood to mean strength even though there were no native lions in England.

More generally, I have (as you can see from the above) been including the continent in my comments. Rabbits and deer were commonly used on tapestries and paintings throughout Europe to express some of the meanings I mentioned.

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 04:16 AM

Rabbits to me have always meant food... we bred them ourselves to eat. It was something you did in the country, and a habit picked up from when my grandfather supplied half the village with rabbit meat during the war. They've always been a food stock, not a hunting pursuit - no-one ever wrote a song about 'hunting the hare' or 'the bonny black bunny' did they? (I'm happy to be surprised).

I still reckon the pictures depict hares, both in England and mainland Europe. Hares have a much more ethereal folklore about then... moon gazing and boxing matches, that sort of thing. But we're digressing. Again.

LTS

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 04:36 AM

Liz,you have opened new possibilities.

The White Rabbit of Howden awaits as does the Bonny Black Rabbit - just too good to miss!

L in C

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 04:57 AM

That was supposed to be 'hunting the rabbit', there IS a song called 'hunting the hare'...

The Bonny white Bunny has possibilities.... as does The Laidley Coney.... just don't sing them on Portland, Dorset. They don't like bunnies there.

LTS

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 05:24 AM

The book to look out for is The Leaping Hare by George Ewart Evans & David Thomson - a fine overview of the hare in folklore, mythology, natural & oral history etc. One of my many bibles!

On the subject of hares & green men, check this out:

Three Hares Project.

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Nerd
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 05:51 AM

Liz,

There's "my last farewell to Stirling":

"No more I'll wander through the Glen
Nor Disturb the roost of the pheasant hen
nor chase the rabbit frae his den
when I am far frae Stirlin'-o"

There are two different songs called "The Broomdasher," which is a gypsy word for a rabbit-catcher; the better known has been collected several times from the Levi Smith family.

Getting back to the middle ages, the animals on, for example, the Lady and Unicorn Tapestries in the Cluny are certainly rabbits and not hares. There is a late medieval tapestry called "Rabbit Hunting with Ferrets," which I've seen in the Fine Arts Museum in San Francisco. The Unicorn tapestries in NY have the juxtaposed deer and rabbit I was speaking of, visible here.

At this page, they positively identify that as a rabbit--it's too chubby and short-eared to be a hare!

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 06:16 AM

Sea,

trust you had a good time at the Saracens Head?

The Hare Project is amazing. Does it have a lot to do with Cathederel builders?

sorry my computer is playing up - must close

Les

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: GUEST,JT
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 06:23 AM

[Rabbits have] always been a food stock, not a hunting pursuit

Not sure about that, Liz. See www.rabbithuntinginfo.com, for example

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 07:45 AM

Excellent night at the Saracen's Head - Rachel's birthday too, so it was nice joining in with celebrations for Bernard's 60th! Has Thousands or More ever sounded so melodious?

Otherwise; Three Hares / Tinners Rabbits... interesting stuff, though they have altered their earlier ideas on the green man since I contacted them, prior to this they were pushing the usual Raglanite line of pagan folkloric fertility emblems. I instinctively baulk at the mention of archetypes in any context however. Jung seems to be the cornerstone of a lot of new age claptappery that I find irksome in the extreme... Otherwise, yes - fascinating stuff, though I've not seen many in my travels, though there is a mediaeval tile of such a design reported in Chester Cathedral.

The area of the north Fylde now occupied by Fleetwood was, as recently as 1836, a rabbit warren...

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Nerd
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 01:56 PM

Les,

haven't you heard of the ancient Celtic fertility gods known as the green hare and the big green rabbit?

(Pull the other one, it's got leaves on...)

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 15 Aug 08 - 02:32 AM

Nerd, you are communicating with one who has been Dwile Flonking!

Wassail, so to speak

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 15 Aug 08 - 05:23 AM

I too have Dwyle Flonked - was disturbed to see on Channel 5 TV last Wednesday that in Gloucestershire they do it without a blindfold... it's much more fun when the flonker can't see.

LTS

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 15 Aug 08 - 07:00 AM

Pre-Christian - certainly pagan or what Liz?

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 15 Aug 08 - 08:20 PM

Okay, Les - reluctant to trust Google on so obviously significant a subject as Dwile Flonking, and being of a folkloric bent with regard to getting things from horses mouths... Enlighten me!

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 16 Aug 08 - 03:03 AM

I competed in a team in the "All Cheshire Finals" around 1971 or 2 at the Chester Festival. It's all a haze now.

I seem to remember two sides, one "In" as in cricket the other "Out". Each member of the "In" team came forward in turn to "Flonk" and had a stick with a beer soaked rag or Dwile in the end. The "Out" team formed a circle around the "Flonker" and moved around holding hands.

The "Dwile" was "Flonked" at members of the "Out" team and points were given - something like three for a head, two for a body, one for a leg. If the "Flonker" missed S/he had to drink a pint of beer in one go.

I suspect the "game" has evolved since. I have this vague memory that it came from the Goon Show in the 19 50s or at least from Michael Bentine but I am not certain about that.

Cheers

Les

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: GUEST,Dwile Flonker
Date: 16 Aug 08 - 11:45 AM

Interestingly, Dwile Flonking is mentioned in the annals of the Roman Historian Taciternius in the context of Pagan Celtic Druidic ritual, He mentions the competitors as wearing masks made of oak & holly leaves, with branches of same clutched between their teeth. In his own words barbarus presencia illorum viridis foliatus stipes os ludio ludius...

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 16 Aug 08 - 12:12 PM

Really?

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 16 Aug 08 - 01:47 PM

Dwile Flonking - sounds kind of early Romano British as 'ell as like

Good try though os ludio ludius...

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: GUEST,Nerd
Date: 17 Aug 08 - 01:18 AM

Dwile flonking is a fascinating topic in its own right, and probably deserving of its own thread. Any dwile flonking songs?

Back to foliate heads, one thing that is surprising is the extent to which this tradition still exists. For example, in New York where I was born and raised, there are many foliate heads carved into buildings, primarily between about the Civil War (1860s) and the Great Depression. I have a book that's got about 50 foliate head photos from NYC, and no doubt there are more.

The question that occurs to me is: was there a "gap" of several hundred years when no one carved foliate heads, or have stone carvers continued to use this motif in an unbroken line from the middle ages?

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 17 Aug 08 - 02:42 AM

There are changes in fashionable architecture, just as there are in fashionable clothing.

Foliate heads on buildings were probably seen as old fashioned at some point, but like the mini skirt and flared jeans, they come storming back into fashion every now and then. Some, like mini skirts are welcomed, others, like flared jeans, should be left to the annals of history and never ever seen again.

LTS

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 17 Aug 08 - 05:02 AM

I have a book that's got about 50 foliate head photos from NYC, and no doubt there are more

Would that be Nightmares in the Sky? I picked it up in a charity shop in Lytham St Annes for 50p! A truly amazing book. I'm looking at Foliate Heads in a secular / municipal context too, and the North West of England seems particularly well served. Here's a few of my favourites:

Blackpool (Hotel?)

Preston (Waterstones)

Chester, Lanes

One the puzzles here is that whilst the Victorians were evidently very fond of Foliate Heads, they seem to be a feature of the Neo-Classical rather than Neo-Gothic, where one might expect to find them. As I mentioned above, the Neo-Gothic Roman Catholic Cathedral in Norwich is replete, but, in general, the buildings of the secular Neo-Gothic seem a tad bereft. In Manchester, for example, one might scour the magnificent Gothic Town Hall in vane, whereas the surrounding Classical buildings are particularly well served. This is just an observation of mine by the way, if anyone can provide examples to the contrary I'd be interested to know about them.

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Nerd
Date: 17 Aug 08 - 11:01 PM

No, Insane Beard, it's a brand new book called Faces in Stone, by Robert Arthur King. It's got pictures of many, many faces on NYC buildings, only some of which--50 or so--are foliate heads.

You can see more about the book here.

Although the description of the publisher says "one hundred architectural details," they really mean details from one hundred buildings. In fact, I estimate there are about 200 details, about fifty of which are foliate heads.

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Nerd
Date: 17 Aug 08 - 11:03 PM

To clarify, Insane Beard seems most fond of disgorginf foliate heads. Only a few of the NYC ones in this book disgorge leaves. Most are faces made of leaves.

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Nerd
Date: 18 Aug 08 - 01:02 AM

Oops. That should have been "disgorging..."

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 18 Aug 08 - 06:06 AM

I'll have to think about that, Nerd. Meanwhile, here's a ingenious Victorian leaf-mask (in a neo-Classical context!) from Waterstones in Preston, Lancs:

Leaf Mask, Preston

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: Nerd
Date: 18 Aug 08 - 04:35 PM

I just got to have a look at the "Three Hares" project above...that IS amazing!

Les, I'm sorry no one answered your posts of

13 Aug 08 - 02:25 AM (My paraphrase: did the green man emerge from the churches into the plays, and if so, so what?)

and

13 Aug 08 - 07:20 AM ("It seems a fair assumption that nobody would mess with the early church by putting pagan symbols in the walls.")

Both good questions/points which deserve further mention.

As to the first one, I don't think most people would say the green man entered the dramatic tradition from the church walls. The "wild man of the woods" who by the 16th Century seems to have been covered with leaves and called "green man" is actually an ancient literary character type (we'll avoid the baggage of the term "archetype," which I agree is problematic). As such it goes back to Gilgamesh, one of the very first literary plots we have, so it is old indeed. Although Enkidu of Gilgamesh did not use leaves, at some point the idea of the wild man reached countries that were heavily forested, where this would be a natural thing for a wild man to do. At some point prior to the 1570s, the character type started to be called a "green man," after the leaves he was wearing.

Characters like this existed in literature and folklore all over Britain and Ireland (Lailoken in Scotland, Myrddin in Wales, Suibhne in Ireland). So the wild man/green man of the plays may be derived simply from such literary and folkloric figures. Certainly such figures exist in European literature and folklore before the foliate head begins appearing in cathedrals.

The question, then, is: was the "Foliate Head" derived from such figures, or were some of the same ideas being expressed by both? This is hard to answer, because people who carved foliate heads didn't comment much on them. But the connections that Centerwell points to suggest that the two traditions were associated by some people as early as the high middle ages.

On to your second point: I don't necessarily agree that no-one would "mess with" the Church by incorporating pagan elements into the design. In fact, practically everything in the Jewish- Christian- Islamic complex of religions WAS based on earlier polytheistic elements. Furthermore, it was a policy of the early Church to adapt elements of local pagan practice in order to facilitate the assimilation of pagan groups.   

For both of these reasons, it's certain that items with pagan origins were indeed featured in churches. Baptismal fonts, censers, and other elements of Church architecture and furniture were surely adapted from pagan predecessors. Churches themselves were often placed directly on the sites of previous pagan worship.

As a good example, angels and demons, which came to Christianity through Jewish tradition, were based on the gods of Judaism's pagan antecedents, especially those of Canaanite mythology. So every angel you see in a stained glass window is, in fact, a medieval imagining of a Christian interpretation of a pagan god.

Those who claim the foliate head may also be a medieval imagining of a Christian interpretation of a pagan god therefore aren't making a wildly extraordinary claim. It's just never been proven. And, as Insane Beard would point out, the people who make this claim often then ascribe meanings to the pagan god they imagine is being represented, which are hard to square with reality.

To connect your two points, most pagan gods who seem to have had a meaning anywhere close to the one that New Agers try to ascribe to the Foliate Head, such as Sylvanus, resemble the wild man/green man of the plays much more than the foliate head. For this reason, a strong connection between the Foliate Head and the Wild Man/Green Man would lend a little much-needed support to the idea of a Foliate Head as a pagan deity.

More cautious observers like Insane Beard try guard against the new agers' glibness in interpreting these traditions. Therefore, they emphasize the small amount of evidence that exists for such a connection.

For myself, I do not dispute that there is a only small amount of evidence. I don't have any particular attachment to the idea that the Green Man has some connection to pagan deities, and I haven't seen any compelling evidence of it. But I do think it should be recognized that

(1) the evidence that we do have is not all recent, and some of it may date back right to the high middle ages.

(2) There is no particular reason NOT to think there is some connection between the Foliate Head and pre-Christian religion, as there is with almost all other elements of Christianity. But this is no reason to jump to conclusions about the meaning of the Foliate Head in general, or about the meaning of any individual example of the Foliate Head.

and

(3) if the Foliate Head is somehow connected to pagan mythology, his appearance in churches is not particularly anomalous or unusual--although specifically Celtic pagan elements are rare.

Subject: RE: Any info about the green man?
From: GUEST,BigDaddy
Date: 18 Aug 08 - 05:59 PM

"The Green Man" by Martin Donnelly is lovely.