Sacred Plants of Pre-Christian Germanic Society

The religious experiences of Pre-Christian Germanic society was influenced by the use of mind expanding plants. With the modernization of society, much of this lore has been lost or hidden in the chronciles of time. Today, modern man has replaced their usage with alcohol, tobacco and other substances.

Many of these sacred plants were used to flavor sacrificial drinks, used in medicine, and to exorcise harmful spirits. Some were used in the fertility rites for themselves, their animals and the fields.

Some of these plants include:

Henbane (used in beer)

Hemp (used around 10,000 years for fiber, food, medicine and as an intoxicant)

Poppy

Henbane

Black Henbane contains various tropane alkaloids that can lead to extreme changes in consciousness (euphoria, hallucination, trance, delirium and death). Henbane has been considered a 'plant of the gods' since very early times. It is one of the rare, and therefore protected, plants of Europe. It is normally found growing near cultic sites and ruins.

Because of it's rarity, the Germanic people cultivated it in gardens. Famous henbane gardens were grown in places whose current names still show evidence of their former status: Pilsenee (henbane lake), in the regions of Bilsengarden (henbane garden) and Bilstein (henbane stone), and in the Czech city of Pilsen (henbane).

The Pre-Indo-European natives of the Alps placed seeds in the urns of friends and family members. The Gaelic Celts also used the herb in the preparation of arrow poisoning and killing elders who could no longer work and were dependent upon others. At their own request, aged and frail people were sent first on a trip, and then to the beyond, with a brew of henbane.

The Germanic people used henbane for magical and religious rituals, medicine and love magic. When possible the herb was to be harvested by a naked girl who was consecrated to the divine nature of the plant.

Bishop Burchard of Worms (ca. 965-1025) described a heathen henbane weather magic ritual of the tenth century:

During a period of incessant drought the girls gathered together, stripped one of their playmates naked and searched for belisa (ie., henbane). The naked girl had to pull it out with her right hand, and it was then bound to her small toe of her right foot. Afterward some of the girls, with sticks in their hands, led the naked one to the nearest stream and sprinkled her with water. doing this was suppose to call down the desired rain. Then the girl, who now had to walk backward like a crab, was led back to where they had begun.

One of henbanes most important religious role is in the libational offering of honor to the thunder god Donar/Thor. Tacitus wrote that the Germanic peoples have always been heavy beer drinkers and that they drank many different kinds of beer. Lighter beer for daily enjoyment, strong beer for the ram and buck services, and heavy beer for winter solstice. Henbane was added to beer and named pilsener. Henbane beer was a potent intoxicant, aphrodesiac, and could reveal spiritual visions. Pilsener beer doesn't make one sleepy like hop beer does. The 'true pilsener' is the only beer that makes you thirstier the more you drink!

Hemp

Hemp has been used for around 10,000 years for fiber, food, oil, medicine, and as a euphoric. It is perhaps the oldest cultivated plant. It stimulates the imagination and one may experience changes in the time-space continuum.

Hemp was established by the Germanic culture before the fifth century and was cultivated in fields along with flax. It was sown, tended, and harvested by women. From archeological digs it has been discovered that the Germanic and Celtic tribes were already placing hemp flowers in the graves of their dead 2,500 years ago.

Hemp was associated with the erotic goddess Freya. The formula lina laukaz 'hemp and leek' appears on many bracteates. If used to flavor beer, like it's close botanical relative the hop, hemp may have been sacred to the vanir deities whose powers extended to love, sex and fertility.

The tough fibrous nature of the plant is ideal for the production of strong fabric such as rope and canvas. Remains of its cultivation were found in excavations at Coppergate, York. Samples from Crose Mere, Shropshire contained so much 5th-8th century hemp pollen that it must have been used as a retting pond, in which the plant was immersed for weeks until the softer part had rotted away, leaving the more durable fibers which could then be used for rope-making, canvas and other purposes.

Poppy

In Anglo-Saxon England and other parts of Europe the white poppy grows wild in some regions. The red or field poppy is now a common pasture weed but the white poppy is rich in sedatives and hypnotic substances which is used in pain-killers. In some countries districts, children feared to pick the poppy flower, lest doing so should bring on a thunderstorm, but the plant could be placed among the roof timbers to keep lightening away from the house.

*Disclaimer* These plants are in no way to be used without doctor's supervision. This article was written for entertainment purposes only and is not an attempt to promote the usage of the plants herein*