Cunigunde's Fiery Embers. Potentilla indica, Uffelse Beek, Grathem, Limburg, The Netherlands
On Saturday I walked along the Uffelse Beek (Uffel Brook) just outside the village of Grathem not far from the Meuse River in Limburg. 't Was an overcast afternoon, but a thinner patch in the clouds quite suddenly cast its light on the edge of a glade. The fiery embers of hundreds of these Mock Strawberries (Potentilla or Duchesnea indica) sparkled before my eyes.
From the late 10th century until 1797 and its incorporation by revolutionary France into the new department of Meuse-Inférieure, Grathem was one of the villages of the smallest independent principality of the Holy German Empire, that of Thorn, its seat, only a few kilometers away. It was singular by the fact that down through the centuries it was ruled by women. Thorn had been founded in 975 as a Benedictine religious house for nuns. But it soon became a secular - albeit devout - convent and principality governed by an abbess with twenty ladies of the highest nobility. They all lived in the castle and the pretty white-washed houses of the town of Thorn.
The last abbess - she was made to abdicate in 1797 - was Maria Cunigunde of Saxony (1740-1826). Her matron saint is, of course, St Cunigunde (c.975-1040). The latter and her husband - Emperor St. Henry II (973-1024) - were so 'saintly' that they decided not to consummate their marriage. When aspersions were cast on St Cunigunde's chastity, she 'proved' them wrong by walking unscathed on flaming irons and embers.
Had Maria Cunigunde wandered along this brook, she likely would not have been reminded by our Potentilla indica of the saintly plight of her forebear. It seems that this Potentilla wasn't imported into these Limburg lands from the Indies until the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The pretty plants - flowering yellow - served first for horticulture and for decorative purposes. Ultimately they were widely naturalised, giving pleasure to anyone taking care not to trample them under foot.
Cunigunde's Fiery Embers. Potentilla indica, Uffelse Beek, Grathem, Limburg, The Netherlands
On Saturday I walked along the Uffelse Beek (Uffel Brook) just outside the village of Grathem not far from the Meuse River in Limburg. 't Was an overcast afternoon, but a thinner patch in the clouds quite suddenly cast its light on the edge of a glade. The fiery embers of hundreds of these Mock Strawberries (Potentilla or Duchesnea indica) sparkled before my eyes.
From the late 10th century until 1797 and its incorporation by revolutionary France into the new department of Meuse-Inférieure, Grathem was one of the villages of the smallest independent principality of the Holy German Empire, that of Thorn, its seat, only a few kilometers away. It was singular by the fact that down through the centuries it was ruled by women. Thorn had been founded in 975 as a Benedictine religious house for nuns. But it soon became a secular - albeit devout - convent and principality governed by an abbess with twenty ladies of the highest nobility. They all lived in the castle and the pretty white-washed houses of the town of Thorn.
The last abbess - she was made to abdicate in 1797 - was Maria Cunigunde of Saxony (1740-1826). Her matron saint is, of course, St Cunigunde (c.975-1040). The latter and her husband - Emperor St. Henry II (973-1024) - were so 'saintly' that they decided not to consummate their marriage. When aspersions were cast on St Cunigunde's chastity, she 'proved' them wrong by walking unscathed on flaming irons and embers.
Had Maria Cunigunde wandered along this brook, she likely would not have been reminded by our Potentilla indica of the saintly plight of her forebear. It seems that this Potentilla wasn't imported into these Limburg lands from the Indies until the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The pretty plants - flowering yellow - served first for horticulture and for decorative purposes. Ultimately they were widely naturalised, giving pleasure to anyone taking care not to trample them under foot.