Cabinet of Curiosities - Harry Potter: A History of Magic at the British Library by Charlotte Wightwick

So I’m cheating a bit this month. The Cabinet of Curiosities is supposed to be one object which I’d love to have for myself. However I couldn’t resist talking about the current exhibition at the British Library on Harry Potter; A History of Magic, which is itself a compendium of incredible objects.

It’s a fantastic exhibition, making brilliant use of archive material, historical artefacts and modern technology to create an experience unlike any I’ve been to before. It combines original Harry Potter archive material and memorabilia with historical manuscripts and objects, setting J.K. Rowling’s fantasy world into the context of real historical beliefs about magic, with technology providing an interactive experience for those who want to try their own hands at ‘magic’.

So, for instance, the exhibition includes hand- and type-written excerpts from J.K Rowling’s original manuscripts (complete with editorial suggestions and some entirely unknown scenes which were cut from the final books), novel plans and some of her own early drawings of characters and locations – an absolute treasure trove for fans and fellow writers. There are also a large number of original drawings and paintings from the illustrated versions of the books by Jim Kay, with sound effects and objects from the films too.

The exhibition is organised into a number of different rooms, each of which is dedicated to an individual Hogwarts’ ‘lessons’ – Potions, Charms, Defence Against the Dark Arts, etc. In each case, Rowling’s archive material is cleverly interspersed with manuscripts and objects which explore ‘real life’ historical beliefs surrounding magic.

For example, the Herbology room includes Jim Kay’s illustrations of the greenhouses as Hogwarts; J.K. Rowling’s own drawing of Professor Sprout and some stunningly beautiful Herbals from the British Library’s Collection. The Care of Magical Creatures room is another highlight for anyone who loves medieval bestiaries and illuminated manuscripts.

The Astrology room contains stunning early globes, astrolables and orreries, as well as medieval manuscripts with illustrations of centaurs and other mythological creatures relating to the constellations. One of my favourite items in the exhibition was the sixteenth century ‘volvelle’ – a beautiful rotating paper model – of an astrological chart with a dragon at its centre, from Petrus Apianus’ Astronomicum Caesareum. The dragon could be spun in order to determine the latitude of the moon, or to cast horoscopes.

Similarly, the Divination room contains a whole raft of artefacts and manuscripts showing how different practices to determine the future have been used through centuries and across continents (another great feature of the exhibition is that it doesn’t restrict itself to European traditions of magic, but looks across continents and civilisations) – and makes use of modern technology to allow younger visitors the chance to look into their own futures.

So, which would be my one object to take home for my Cabinet of Curiosities, if I was allowed? Its tricky. The spinning astrological dragon would have to be up there. But then I’m also enough of a Potter fan to covet one of J.K. Rowling’s own drawings. The beautifully intricate gold filigree case containing a bezoar stone was also stunning.

But the thing I did actually take away with me, apart from a head full of wonder? The exhibition book. As well as beautiful colour photos of many of the exhibits, it also contains some fascinating essays by authors as diverse as astronaut Tim Peake, TV wildlife expert Steve Backshall, and author Anna Pavord. The exhibition’s curator, Julian Harrison, provides the overall foreword. He also tweets regularly, including about his favourite objects from the exhibition, and is well worth a follow @julianpharrison. 

My object for my Cabinet of Curiosities!

The exhibition book, published by Bloomsbury

To find out more about the exhibition (including whether there are any tickets left! It closes at the end of February) the website is:

https://www.bl.uk/events/harry-potter-a-history-of-magic

If you do get the opportunity, I really would encourage you to go. It’s a wonderful example of how stories, even those set in with a supposedly fantastical backdrop, can stimulate our imaginations about the truth of history and of the world around us.

KISSING COMFITS AND SNOW ERINGOES: APHRODISIACS, by Jane Borodale

Eryngium maritimum © Valerie Hill 

Effective, practical enhancement of the art of love has been sought after since ancient times. Roots of sea holly or Eryngium maritimum were collected on a large scale in England during the 17th and 18th centuries for candying as restorative, quasi-aphrodisiac pastilles, known as eryngoes. Old records of Colchester show that the town was famous for oysters and eryngo root, where a 17th-century apothecary called Robert Burton set up a manufactory to made these popular sweetmeats, candied with sugar and orange-blossom water. They even get a mention in the 'Merry Wives of Windsor', when Falstaff, off to meet Mistress Ford in Windsor Forest, declares; ‘…hail kissing comfits and snow eringoes; let there come a tempest of provocation…’ 

Sea holly grows well in gardens (you absolutely wouldn’t collect it from the wild anymore – it’s far too scarce) and Mrs Grieve suggests digging up the roots at the end of the season, from plants at least two years old. Geoffrey Grigson points out wryly that, ‘careful wives grew Sea Holly in the physic garden.’ (What are you waiting for...?)

Pliny describes it as a sweet savouring root. 16th-century botanist William Turner writes of its virtues; ‘to stir up the lust of the body, and … give it to both men and women that are desirous to have childer. Some condite (candy) or keep in sugar the roots for this purpose.’ Nicolaus Alexandrinus of the late 13th century has four medicines using this herb which he ‘maketh to stir up the pleasure of the body, and to make men and women fruitful.’

Sea holly © Valerie Hill

Here’s a 17th-century recipe for Candied Eringo-roots from Hannah Woolley. I have it on good authority that it is effective – but don’t blame me for consequences of any sort whatever:

Take of your Eringo-roots ready to be preserved, and weigh them, and to every pound of Roots you must take of the purest Sugar you can get two pound, and clarifie it with the whites of Eggs exceedingly well, that is may be as clear as Crystal; it being clarified, you must boil it to the height of Manus Christi, and then dip in your Roots two or three times till they are all Candyed; put them in a Stove, and so keep them all the year.

Dorothy Hartley gives us a hand-me-down recipe for Eyringo Jelly (sometimes called Gloucester Jelly as sea holly grew in the estuary):

1 oz each of sago, hartshorn shavings, eyringo root, and pearl barley; put into a pan with 2 quarts water, and boil until reduced to 1 quart. Strain and let it set – it should be stiff. Slices of it should be put into invalid drinks (!) – or it may be flavoured and sweetened and eaten as a jelly.

She also suggests Eryingo toffee:

Boil some of the sliced root in a little water till well flavoured, and add this water to the sugar and butter with which you make the toffee: just as it is ready to set, drop the softened root chips into it.

Early purple orchid © Valerie Hill

It wouldn’t be representative of the early herbals if I didn’t include mention of them getting it perfectly wrong. A popular but useless aphrodisiac came from the orchid (or standergrasse) family. ‘Orchis’ is from the Greek orkhis meaning literally ‘testicle’, and the plant acquired attributes of sympathetic magic due to the shape of its tuber. Orchids, particularly Orchis mascula or Early Purple were cited as a vital ingredient in a sweet electuary known as a diasatyrion, which combined Orchid tubers with dates, various nuts including pistachios, galingale, peppers, musk, ambergris, grains of paradise, ash-keys, nettle seed and Malaga wine, and which was prescribed by the College of Physicians in London as ‘a provocative to venery’. Henry Lyte’s 'New Herball' of 1578 says: ‘the full and sappy roots of Standergrasses (but especially of Hares Ballocks, or Goates Orchis) eaten, or boyled in Goates milke and drunken, provoketh Venus, or bodily lust.’

But there were plenty of other options if you couldn’t get your hands on either of these. Pliny suggests that artichokes ‘taken in wine stirreth up the lust of the body… but likewise as this herb provoketh lust in women, so it abateth the same in men.’ As ever it depends on whom you read, and Henry Lyte disagrees on the finer point; ‘the first springes or tender impes of the Artichoke sodden in good broth with bytter, doth mightily stirre up the lust of the bodie both in men and women, causeth sluggish men to be diligent in Sommer…’ Aniseed (Pimpinella anisum) is a traditional aphrodisiac, a sweet, warming stimulant herb. Turner says of anise that ‘it stirreth men to the pleasure of the body.’ There was lovage, and garlic. Ayurvedic medicine still regards garlic as rejuvenative and aphrodisiac. Turner says that it ‘stirreth men to venery, drunken with green Coryander and strong wine.’

Ash keys © Valerie Hill

Anyone could obtain a bit of ash out in the woods or on the roadside – its seeds according to Dioscorides, ‘provoke lust’ or ‘render a man more spirited with ladies’. Lyte says, ‘The seed of the ashe-tree increaseth naturall seed, and stirreth by Venus, especially being taken with a Nutmeg, as Isaac, Rhasis, Damascenus, and many other Arabian Physitions doe write.’

Other traditional spring tonics like watercress (nasturtium) and parsley feature often in the herbals as having aphrodisiac virtues. Turner claims that ‘Persely… stirreth up appetite to cold women’, and it’s notable that parsley oil is used today in perfumes for men. There was saffron, or coriander seeds, or leeks and onions; in some regions of France there was a custom of preparing onion soup for newly-weds after their wedding night. Pliny suggested that if southernwood (also called lad’s love) ‘…be layed under the bed, pillow or bolster, it provoketh carnall copulation, and resisteth all inchantments, which may let or hinder such businesse, and the inticements to the same.’

The opposite effect.

Just in case, I should point out one or two easy-to-find antidotes or anaphrodisiacs: such as mallow, hops and lettuce. The Pythagoreans knew lettuce as the 'eunuch’s plant', but luckily you need more than a bowlful of salad for it to have an effect, it’s the concentrated milky juice or sap, the 18th-century 'lettuce opium' that has the sedative power.

And while I’m in this bodily vein (it’s all sex and death today) – there are still tickets left for the upcoming Medicine and Mortality weekend at the Weald and Downland Museum in Sussex, 21-22 Sep. Historians including Ian Mortimer, Clare Gittings and Owen Davies will talk about health, fatal illnesses, magic, medicine and funeral rituals; medical herbalist Christina Stapley will demonstrate historical herb recipes – ask her about eryngoes! – and much more.

And that, people, is my very last post. I’ve absolutely loved being a History Girl and will go on reading HG posts galore, but right now must bury myself and do nothing but write, write, write, for a while.

Thank you for having me, and adieu… 

www.janeborodale.com

On putting words into the mouths of the departed, by Jane Borodale

Popular myth has it that the hollow stalks of certain umbelliferous plants lead straight down to the place of the dead. I’m transfixed by this idea, that you might pour yourself through their narrow, jointed tubes, to arrive in the otherworld.


The virtues and dangers of individuals from the Umbelliferae family through history range from poison to plague cure – hemlock, fool’s parsley, water parsnip, lovage, alexanders, pepper saxifrage, sweet cicely, fennel, sanicle, angelica. These plants can be difficult for the unwary or careless to identify: see how similar they can look.

Hemlock Water-dropwort © Valerie Hill

Hemlock Water-dropwort © Valerie Hill

Hemlock Water-dropwort (not for nothing once called Dead Tongue, or Horsebane in Somerset) is so highly poisonous it could take you quickly to the otherworld in person, bypassing all metaphors. Mrs Grieve in her 20^th-century classic A Modern Herbal describes how in April 1857, ‘two farmer’s sons were found lying paralysed and speechless close to a ditch where they had been working. Assistance was soon rendered, but they shortly afterwards expired. A quantity of Water Hemlock grew in the ditch, where they had been employed.  A piece of the root was subsequently found with the marks of teeth in it, near to where the men lay, and another piece of the same root was discovered in the pocket of one of them.’

Angelica sylvestris © Valerie Hill

Angelica sylvestris © Valerie Hill

But the channel between worlds could go either way. In the 16^th century (when my new novel The Knot is set) the umbellifer Angelica archangelica with its fat, crisp, candiable stems and potent properties against the plague could actively help you return from the dead, offer you a hand back up those hollow stems. Henry Lyte’s Niewe Herball or Historie of Plants (1578) is one of many that points out how, ‘the late writers say, that the roots of Angelica are contrary to all poyson, the pestilence, and all naughty corruption of evill or infected aire.’

And I like to think of writing about the dead, too, as being a two-way possibility. On the one hand we take from them and give them voices they didn’t necessarily have and they have no say in the matter, yet there is also an obscure reciprocal kind of deal whereby the living pay attention to the dead for a while, warm up thoughts towards them, listen harder maybe? I like to think it is an acceptable practice, if the unwitting participant is approached with utmost diligence and respect and a certain kind of openness to unspoken things beneath the surface – resonances, textures, fragments of things left over from the past that might be so small that they can’t easily be pinned down into immoveable ‘truths’. Isn’t it this gap that historical fiction can animate so effectively?

Even as I write this I can see a tangle of metaphors emerging that I don’t quite mean. Words – like plants, weeds, umbellifers – can rapidly get out of hand, and paths to questions of identity are fraught with hazard…

Angelica sylvestris © Valerie Hill

Jane Borodale’s new novel The Knot is about the botanist Henry Lyte (c1529-1607) and his translation of an influential 16^th-century herbal.


Her website is here