Interacting With Ivy

Interacting With Ivy

Like many other evergreen plants, which impressed European cultures by persisting through the winter, ivy has traditionally been imbued with a spiritual significance. It was brought into homes to drive out evil spirits.  It is rich in mythology.   Rituals are central to many spiritual traditions, and when plants are not the explicit focus, they are often the means by which ritual is accomplished.  For example, in South Indian temples, many plant-human relations are called upon in the assembly of complex rituals. Plants can also provide the setting within which ritual and spiritual practice occurs.     In Ancient Rome it was believed that a wreath of ivy could prevent a person from becoming drunk, and such a wreath was worn by Bacchus, the god of intoxication.[8] Ivy bushes or ivy-wrapped poles have traditionally been used to advertise taverns in the United Kingdom, and many pubs are still called The Ivy.[20]   The clinging nature of ivy makes it a symbol of love and friendship, there was once a tradition of priests giving ivy to newlyweds,[8] and as it clings to dead trees and remains green, it was also viewed as a symbol of the eternal life of the soul after the death of the body in medieval Christian symbolism.[21]     IVY on a gravestone symbolises immortality. The hardiness of the plants - the near impossibility of ridding your garden of the vines - makes them motifs for regeneration and endless life.   The traditional British Christmas carol, The Holly and the Ivy, uses ivy as a symbol for the Virgin Mary.   Ivy-covered ruins were a staple of the Romantic movement in landscape painting, for example 'Visitor to a Moonlit Churchyard' by Philip James de Loutherbourg (1790), 'Tintern Abbey, West Front' by Joseph Mallord William Turner (1794) and 'Netley Abbey' by Francis Towne (1809). In this context ivy may represent the ephemerality of human endeavours and the sublime power of nature   Recording variation in Ivy leaves   This activity provides an opportunity to plan an investigation of the variables that might affect the growth of ivy, and a chance to review ideas about factors affecting plant growth. The detail of the relationship between leaf width, petiole length and environmental conditions is complex. It is a good example investigation to develop skills relevant to How Science Works.   Ivy   At times when we feel that it is a wall, unavoidably a wall, then without a word ivy goes climbing up the wall. At times when we say that it is a wall of despair with no drop of water, where not one seed can survive, unhurrying, the ivy advances. Hand in hand, several together, it climbs on, a span’s breadth at a time. It grasps the despair and will not let go until the despair is all covered in green. At times when we shake our heads, saying that wall cannot be climbed, one ivy leaf leads thousands of other ivy leaves and finally climbs over that wall.   “Ivy” is one of Do Jong-Hwan’s most popular poems, reproduced (in Korean) thousands of times on the Internet by his admirers. Like many of his poems, it begins with a familiar scene linked to nature and the traditional countryside (modern apartment blocks rarely have ivy-covered walls) but then takes the scene as an image of a truth about human existence. The patient progress of ivy up a dry, harsh surface ends in victory as it reaches the top of the wall and passes beyond. Despair is overcome; new hope is born.