About this Object

This specimen was collected by Martin F. Gardner & Sabina G. Kness on the 2^nd of December 2011 and subsequently donated to the Royal Botanic Garden, Ediburgh's Herbarium Collection as part of the organisation's Yew Conservation Project. This specimen comes from an old, male yew tree with a fluted red bole and numerous tall branches rising all around the hollow centre located on the south side of St James' Church outside of Nantglyn, Denbighshire, Wales. The tree is perhaps most noteworthy for the series of stone steps which lead to the pulpit in its hollow centre as captured by Google user, Jane Gracey here.

To see the record for this specimen at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh website, please click here.

Connection to last week's item:.

Gerald of Wales mentions yew trees several times in his Topographia Hibernica, stating that 'yews, with their bitter sap, are more frequently to be found in this country [Ireland] than in any other I have visited; but you will see them principally in old cemeteries and sacred places, where they were planted in ancient times by the hands of holy men to give them what ornament and beauty they could' He does also refer to yew trees in his native Wales, specifically in connection to the account of a 'powerful and nobel personage, by the nae Brachanus' and his 24 daughters!(The historical works of Giraldus Cambrensis containing the Topography of Ireland, and the History of the conquest of Ireland, tr. by T. Forester. The Itinerary through Wales, and the Description of Wales, tr. by sir R.C. Hoare. 186, pp. 125 & 348-349)