These past couple weeks have been insanely busy, and though I haven’t had the time or energy to really sit and think through a blog entry, I’ve spent the few minutes I have had here and there reading up on one of my favorite Irish icons: Leprechauns!! Haha, just kiddin. I love leprechauns just as much as the next person obsessed with Ireland, but with St Patrick’s Day coming up, I’ve had shamrocks on the brain.
White Clover
As it turns out, shamrocks have quite an interesting story. There is not one single definite type of shamrock, it seems most any type of clover could be considered a shamrock. According to my favorite online user run dictionary, Wikipedia, ”The name shamrock is derived from Irish seamróg, which is the diminutive version of the Irish word for clover (seamair).” I like it!
Black Medick
It is believed that the Druids of Ireland honored shamrocks as a sacred plant because they have 3 leaves, and 3 was considered a sacred number. This leads into the most told story of the shamrock which says that St Patrick used the shamrock to explain the Holy Trinity (Father, Son, Holy Spirit) to the pagans to convert them to Christianity. There is quite a bit of lore between St Patrick and shamrocks, but I won’t get into that now.
Back to shamrocks. Shamrocks really seemed to became synonymous with Ireland during the Irish rising against the English crown in the 1770′s.
The shamrock took on further significance during the Irish rebellion of 1798. As a sign of solidarity and hope against the oppressive British rule, brave Irish would pin shamrocks to their clothing. The shamrock symbol was so expressive of Ireland’s rebellious nature and lust for liberty that Britain’s Queen Victoria declared that any person discovered wearing a shamrock would be put to death by hanging.
Thanks, random informative website. :) During that period of time, bearing a shamrock became known as The Wearing of the Green.
Red Clover
Something I also found interesting about shamrocks is that snakes don’t live where shamrocks are. You can see how that ties in to the legend of St Patrick driving out the snakes. But that’s not just in Ireland, that’s anywhere in the world: shamrocks + snakes = 0. Or something like that. Not only that, but apparently shamrocks are a good cure for a snake bite. I’m still looking for concrete evidence on that one, but shamrocks do seem to have a lot of medicinal properties.
At this point, you may have noticed a few photos of clover commonly referred to as shamrocks. I think they’re all beautiful, I honestly do, but I have to say my favorite by far is:
Common Wood Sorrel
Ahh, doesn’t it just look like Ireland?? Enchanting and magical; fitting for the Emerald Isle that we all know and love. Now go gather your shamrocks and get your green on! Only 2 days until St Patrick’s day! :)
