The Butterfly and a Princess of Troy

Several years ago, I planted what is supposed to be an annual in the Canadian climate but, if left alone, will grow back year after year. That is: Rue. It is referred to in Shakespeare for its second meaning of 'regret'. It is also effective against basilisks, which is why I planted it. If the basilisks ever attack, I am set.

But now, I have discovered that Rue is also a host plant for the Papilio polyxenes butterfly, aka Eastern Black Swallowtail, Parsley Swallowtail, Parsnip Swallowtail, etc.. I was weeding away and discovered this delightful fellow. I normally find them on my carrots but I did not plant any this year. While looking up the name of the butterfly so that I do not identify it incorrectly, I noticed the species name and wondered what Polyxena has to do with this butterfly.

The 'papilio' element of the name is easy enough, it is Latin for 'butterfly'. Somehow Swallowtails managed to be 'the butterfly'. For species names, there are two elements, usually both latin. The first element tells the genus and the second element gives you the subspecies. Linnaeus was credited with first assigning latin names to all species as common names differ from place to place but he chose names that related to the attributes of the individual flora or fauna. Such as Cyancita Cristata, which is the species name for a Blue Jay and means 'little blue crested', but this system was changed so that species would be grouped together by genus. For example, Quercus alba means 'white oak' or Quercus rubra, which means 'red oak'. All oak trees start with 'quercus' as part of their name.

One of Linnaeus's students was a Danish man named Johan Christian Fabricius and he started to change the system to what it is today. He also named our butterfly in 1775. He was in the habit of travelling to England to study specimens that had been collected here. The first one he saw was likely collected near Lachine, which is near Montreal, possibly by a Dr. Barnston if I am reading the catalogue correctly. Originally he called it Papilio polyxenes but then in 1787, he called it Papilio Asterias, which it is sometimes called, referring it to Drury's collection and saying they were synonymous. He also wrote that it was a close relative of Papilio troilo, which explains the name 'Polyxenes'.

Polyxene means 'many foreigners', as poly means 'many' or 'much', and xene is 'foreigner' (like xenophobia, fear of foreigners) and so clearly has nothing to do with the attributes of the butterfly. Polyxena was a daughter of Priam. You will not find her in Homer's Iliad because it ends with Hector's funeral and she was caught up in the story of Achilles' death. Achilles surprised her and her brother Troilus (the Troilus of Troilus and Criseyde by Chaucer fame and Troilus and Cressida of Shakespeare) at a water fountain, where he killed Troilus and fell in love with her. He demanded her in marriage from her father and she was given to Achilles in exchange for the body of Hector. She was also able to persuade Achilles to reveal to her his one vulnerable spot which she then was able to relate to Paris (aka Alexander) so that he could kill Achilles. This clearly has nothing to do with the North American butterfly but I did notice that Fabricius used a lot of names from the Iliad and other Greek sources for names and since Polyxena and Troilus go together, so do the butterflies. It would have been nicer if he would have named as many of the new Swallowtails after Priam's children since there were so many and it would have made their naming consistent with each other.

The Greenlanders, Commentary pt.2

One thing the author did to keep her story in the spirit of the Norse was to have people quote mocking verse at each other as a lead in to a fight. Skaldic verse was a very difficult type of poetry and I hate having to translate it. I have no head for riddles. Smiley eschewed the complicated mechanics of proper skaldic verse and kept a simple 'nyah-nyah-nyah' in English which was kinder to the audience and herself.

At times, characters would tell stories, too. Some of the stories were a retelling of events in recent Greenland history with names to protect the innocent and other stories were like the one Gunnar started on page 243.

It was autumn and his son Kollgrim was feeling restless so he told him a story about a woman named Skadi and Leif the Lucky. In the story, Skadi's father Thorir had stolen some apples from Eric the Red and Eric killed him. When Skadi demanded compensation for the death of her father, she asked for a husband, thinking to marry the handsome Leif, and a bellyful of laughter. If this sounds a little like the story of the giantess who demanded to marry Balder in compensation for the death of her father, Thiazi, you would not be wrong.

I am not sure why Smiley changed the names. Truly the church did not like people telling such stories about the old gods but the church was far from Greenland and the Norse were always proud of their heritage. I wonder if she would have been better off leaving the old stories as they were.

The Greenlanders, Commentary pt. 1

Since it is a novel and fictitious, who knows what people talked about especially in a remote area like medieval Greenland. If there is one theme that runs through the novel, I would say it is the terrible things people do to each other when they are ignorant. There do not appear to have been any schools in Greenland.

One way the author has shown the lack of education in the Greenlanders is the discussion they have over the efficacy of the relic of Saint Olaf in the cathedral at Garðar. All they have is the last finger joint of the least finger on the hand of a saint, who is not as revered as St. Nicholas. The cathedral could not compare to the cathedrals of Europe being rather small and surrounded with turf for warmth but it was built of stone and the ruins can be seen today at Igaliku. (as Gardar is known today) Bishop Alf, who is a character in the novel, was the last bishop of Greenland.

One character, Einar, declares that St. Olaf was good for curing scrofula and other skin ills while others say he was good for curing madness. Anyone who has read this blog for any length of time would know that I find mentions of scrofula highly amusing. It was the French and English kings who were said to be able to cure scrofula by touch, a power which they received from St. Marcoul at whose shrine people were said to be cured.

There is an excellent article on the history of the disease in The English Historical Review, published by the Oxford University Press called "The King's Evil" by Frank Barlow. In it, he writes that Marcoul could have been chosen because his name, broken down to mar cou, could be understood as 'bad neck'.

The church at Garðar was called St. Nicholas but, if it ever carried any saint's relics, I have not been able to find out. It should have had relics because any cathedral must carry them. As Garðar was the seat of the bishop of Greenland, St. Olaf would be a good choice in spite of the name, since his relics might be readily available to the archbishop. The name St. Nicholas was chosen because he was the patron saint of sailors This is an ironic choice because once Greenland became part of the kingdom of Norway only the king's ships could trade there. As the king only very rarely sent ships to Greenland, this contributed to their isolation and the degradation of the country as well as eliminating any new migrations to the land. The private ships that traded there had to out of necessity, having been blown off course trying to reach Iceland.

Anyway, in my long and rambling way, I wanted to point out this mention of scrofula and to wonder why nobody ever gets it any more. Not that I want anyone to have it.

The Greenlanders, A Review

This book was given to me by a friend who, knowing I was studying Old Norse and reading the Icelandic sagas, thought I might enjoy it.

Jane Smiley is known more for her novels than her academic work, although she has a PhD. It is clear that she knows her way around an Icelandic saga or two because this novel has the right feel to it and there is attention to the little details that make a story feel 'true'.

Greenland was settled by disgruntled Icelanders lead by Eric the Red. This novel portrays their descendants after the medieval warming spell has come to an end. The winters are harsher and, with every passing year, it becomes harder to keep body and soul together. The original Greenlanders disappeared; the people of European descent who live there now are the result of the Danish king's re-assertion of his claim to the territory in the 18th century. It is not known what happened to the colonies. Several theories are that they were wiped out by disease, lack of access to grains and vegetables and the resulting malnutrition left them vulnerable to malnutrition, raids by hostile Inuit wiped them out, raids by English pirates wiped them out, or that they gradually intermarried with the Inuit and were absorbed by them. Smiley includes a little of all the theories in her tale about the waning days of the Greenland colonies, circa 1400 a.d..

At first, there were so many characters and the story changed its focus to include so many different families and homesteads, I was not sure if anyone was the main character but, closer to the end, it becomes clear that the fading fortunes of the Greenlanders are told through the life of Gunnar Asgeirson. Asgeir, his father, feels adventurous enough to get on a ship to Iceland, while there still was trade with that country, and returned two years later with Helga Ingvadottir as his wife. An old woman in the neighborhood of his homestead, who has the reputation of being a witch, is slighted when she comes to Asgeir's farm and asks for some of his milk. Helga denied her the milk, needing it for herself as she was pregnant with Gunnar. From this little incident and the subsequent bad luck which began to dog Asgeir and his family, it is thought that the old woman had cursed the son and his entire family. Asgeir killed her, hoping to bring an end to the curse but it is only the beginning of cycles of revenge, jealousy and blood feuds that eventually embroil the entire colony and nearly destroy them all.

I shall comment in subsequent posts about various points of interest in the story but, since this is a review, I shall only say that I enjoyed the story. Some might find it too slow going for their liking. It does take a while to warm to its subject and uneducated palates might fail to appreciate the how true to the sagas the story is and how true to the temperaments of its Norse subjects. I found nothing jarring in it and I would recommend it to anyone who wants to know more about Greenland history and culture in the late Middle Ages but does not want to read a history book or peer reviewed article.