Pliny on Erica

Gaius Plinius Secundus greets you!

I have been asked to share with you my knowledge of the plant known as erica, and some of its medicinal applications, which may not be as well known today as they once were.

I shall begin by revisiting my Natural Histories in which I wrote of the erica being also known as myrice, and being used by the people of Ameria to make their brooms. But that is just the beginning of its usefulness.

Erica has many medicinal uses. The leaves, when crushed and taken in drink, are an antidote to the sting of a serpent. Boiled in wine and applied with honey they will heal cancerous sores.

Erica is especially useful in afflictions of the spleen, the juice being extracted and taken with wine. So marvellous is its antipathy to this organ of the body, that if swine drink from a trough made from this wood they will be found to lose the spleen. This is why food and drink are given to sufferers from maladies of the spleen in vessels made of this wood.

Some commentators have dismissed these latter claims, saying that they cannot possibly apply to any of the heaths of Europe, none of which produce wood large enough to make a trough or drinking vessel. They should read my words more closely. I refer to the wood of the tamarice, a much larger tree found in Eurasia and Africa. In fact, we ancients generally grouped together the brooms, heaths and tamarisks, under the name of erica.

And broom, by the way, bruised with axle-grease, is a cure for diseases of the knees.......

Many more such facts could I bring to your notice, but in these hurried days people do not have the time to read at length on various subjects no matter how interesting they may be. I myself have been asked specifically not to exceed twenty lines in this blog. Twenty lines! I believe I have failed to comply.

Unreliable Signs

I'm still puzzling over those botanic chickens, said Pliny the Elder. Where did you say you saw them?

We didn't actually see any chickens, I replied. Botanic or otherwise. It was just the name of a chicken shop, near the Wittunga Botanic Gardens. But we did see plenty of ducks.

Even more puzzling, said Pliny, with a frown. Why didn't they call the shop Botanic Ducks?

The ducks were in the gardens, I said quickly. And the chickens were in the shop. Don't worry about it. I'll tell you what else we saw, Pliny, and this should interest you. We saw a sign that mentioned you by name.

Indeed! In what regard?

It was a sign near the ericas, explaining how the erica got its name. It said that you were the one who called it erica after the greek ereiko, meaning to break or bend, because it was used medicinally for breaking up bladder stones.

What nonsense! exclaimed Pliny. Do they think I am a Greek? I never made up names for things. I simply recorded what was known, at the time. Whoever made that sign should go back and read my works again. They will find that we ancients considered erica to be useful for afflictions of the spleen. And furthermore.....

Pliny, I said, I see that you are very knowledgable on this subject. Perhaps you would like to set the record straight by writing my blog tomorrow?

Certainly, said Pliny, looking pleased at this unexpected sign of interest.

The Minda Dune

Yesterday we had a challenging walk. It was my mum. She said, let's go this way for a change, when we got to the esplanade, so the three of us headed off into the teeth of the wind.

It was alright for her, she had a scarf.

The entire bay was empty, except for one little yacht. The horizon was shipfree. The sea was a deceptive shade of brown. The sort of brown that nips up into spiky jabbing black and green jaws at the corner of your eye, which disappear at once when you confront them.

Eight seagulls flying north. A squishy frothy patch a few metres out from the rocks, near the Minda Dune.

See that dune, says my mum. It's supposed to be a fragile environment. It doesn't look too fragile to me. It's just a mess.

She decides to go back and find a seat to sit on. We two continue into the wind for the sake of good form.

We turn back after five minutes, re-passing the Minda Dune. We look at the sign, which says Fragile Environment. The dune is fifty metres long and is only there by accident. The accident of belonging to Minda Home. Everywhere else has been cleared and built on. It is probably too small to be sustainable

There is a photograph of the types of flowers to be found in the hollows of the dune. They are tiny delicate pink yellow and white. There are no actual flowers anywhere to be seen. Only stunted windswept bushes, gnarled roots and long strings of half dead grasses sticking out at unsustainable angles from the sand.

I stare at it until it becomes beautiful.

Reversals

Pretending to be Brahms! said Pliny the Elder. Whatever next?

That was a device I said, following him pretending to be me.

I'm quite sure he wasn't pretending to be you, said Pliny. He had no idea that some time in the future you would have mislaid something in your handbag at the very time you were listening to his composition. What was it anyway?

It was a comb, I said, and a lipstick. In the circumstances it's not surprising I began to identify with him. I must have looked a little unkempt.

I'm sure you looked exactly the same as usual, said Pliny kindly. By the way, did you see the photograph of the elephants painted to look like pandas in the newspaper yesterday?

No, I said, but I wonder what's reminded you of that?

Nothing, said Pliny. But it was very amusing. Some Thai zookeepers have painted three elephants with white and black paint to remind the people of Thailand not to forget their elephants now that they have a new giant panda.

I hope they don't do that to our elephants when we get our two new giant pandas, I said. That's if we have any elephants, of course. I don't think it's all that funny.

Yes, people laugh at different things, aid Pliny. I recall that yesterday you were laughing at a chicken shop being called Botanic Chickens. Why did you think that was funny?

Pliny, I said, that is intrinsically funny. It was right across the road from the Botanic Park.

No, I still don't get it, said Pliny.

Brahms Loses His Composure

The final Lunch Hour concert for the semester. The Elder Trio. Pliny should be here, he'd like them. I'm listening to Haydn's Piano Trio in A. It starts with three jabs from a pointy compass.
Then I lose interest.

Now I'm listening to Brahms' Piano Trio No 2 in C. It's about losing something from a small bag inside a big one. Then finding it later at the bottom. Loss, rummaging, sadness, resignation, joy. This is exactly what happened to me earlier. Once I get the idea, I lose interest.

At twenty minutes past three, Brahms is walking along King William Street in the direction of the Central Market, where he plans to meet up with Nostradamus. He is not quite level with the Post Office. He looks up. He sees a network of branches covering the dark white sky. The plane trees are nearly bare and a few leaves hang in the air like musical notes. But for some reason he isn't inspired to compose anything.

The Pointy End

You were very quick to agree about the geometry set, I said to Pliny the Elder. I didn't think you ancient Romans thought all that much of geometry.

True, said Pliny. Schoolboys in ancient Rome were generally taught their letters, counting and music at home until they were twelve, then they would go to a school of literature to learn grammar, logic, rhetoric and dialectics. Mathematics and geometry were rather looked down upon as being used by builders and other such people.

So why do you think I should buy one for little Sefu? I asked. Is it because Quintilian recommended the study of geometry? First for the mental training developed by the subject through the logical progression of axioms and proofs. Secondly for its use in political discussions and questions of land measurement?

No, said Pliny.

Well, is it because, as you yourself point out in your Natural Histories, Pamphilus, the first artist to practice painting as a liberal art and the first in painting to be learned in all letters, especially arithmetic and geometry, claimed that without geometry art could never be perfect?

No, said Pliny.

What then?

I simply thought that a fierce-looking child like that would look with glee upon the sharp pointy end of a compass.

The Compass

Goodness me! Who is that child? asked Pliny the Elder, looking at a photograph that had been left out on a table. It showed an African child standing in front of a cracked mud wall.

That's our Kenyan foster child, Sefu Ali, I replied. He's 11 years old. And he's looking none too happy.

An understatement, said Pliny. I have never seen such a thunderous expression in my life, not even on the face of an emperor.

Yes, it gave us quite a turn. We get a photo of him every year, and he always looks quite taciturn, but this one takes the prize. I keep looking at it. The glowering scowl, the piercing stare under the beetling brow, the arms tightly folded over his chest. What if he's trying to tell us something?

If he is, what might it be?

It might be that he would rather be doing something else, like playing soccer. But it looks like something deeper than that. He doesn't want to be exhibited to his benefactors. He's asserting his right not to collude in it.

Good for him! said Pliny. He would make a superb Roman.

I think I'll send him a present, I said. To cheer him up.

What do you send to the child who has nothing? asked Pliny.

Anything. I said. As long as it doesn't weigh more than 500 grams. I'm thinking of a geometry set.

Excellent, said Pliny. Make sure it has a compass.