COMMON ASH
Fraxinus Excelsior

A top canopy tree, ash has a life span of several hundred years. Deep roots strangle those of other trees and plants discouraging other plant development beneath it. The leaves with their multiple leaflets are often mistaken for rowan leaves and the fruit: ‘keys’ resemble ancient medieval keys. These have been pickled and used as a food. The ash loves water and water-absorbing structures are a feature of it.

Some uses:
· AGRICULTURE & GENERAL. For construction of fencing rails, poles, axles for carriages, handles on working tools, spears, arrows, sticks to drive cattle and horses etc. Known as the ‘husbandry tree’, its reputation for strength and pliability resulted in its use for more purposes that any other tree. It occasionally substituted yew in bow making and was used to form the curved tops of gypsy caravans. In former times, it was the second most important wood for aeroplane construction.
· SPORTS. Oars, hockey sticks, tennis rackets, skis etc.
· MEDICINE. Formerly a substitute for Cinchona bark to treat malaria, these days, it is one of three constituents of an effective anti-inflammatory medicine.
· FUEL. The traditional wood of the Yule log. It was used to heat ladies’ chambers as it produced little smoke. ‘Burn ashwood of green, ‘Tis fire for a Queen.’

Country lore predicts – relating to when the tree first leafs:
‘Ash before oak, we’re in for a soak,
Oak before ash, we’re in for a splash.’
A storm brewing? ‘Avoid an ash for it courts a flash.’

The most powerful symbols associated with ash are the World Tree and the Maypole. On the invasion of the Teutons to Britain, the ash replaced the birch as the maypole, which symbolised the solar centre of the celebrations of life. In Norse myth, the World Tree was known as Askr Yggdrasill, ‘the ash-tree that is the horse of Yggr (Odin, Woden, Gwydion). Yggdrasill symbolised the axis of the world around which the universe found harmony and so the ash became identified as a guardian tree and was planted near settlements. Yggr derives from the Greek for ‘sea’ and often gods and goddesses associated with water were identified with ash, e.g. Poseidon (Neptune for the Romans) and Nemesis. The Vikings were known as Aescling (Men of Ash) and constructed the ‘magical’ parts of their ships in ash – the rest being of oak. The gentler cult of Thor eventually overlay the aggressive warrior cult of Odin. However the official Christian conversion of Denmark was in AD 960. Three of the five Magic Trees, which fell in Ireland in 665 AD symbolising the triumph of Christianity over Paganism were ash-trees.

The Druids’ magical healing wands were made of ash as illustrated by one found in Anglesey dating from the first century AD.