Seeing Asemic Patterns, Some St. Patrick's Day Observations, and an Oops

Happy day after St. Patrick's and day before the spring equinox! For many of the vegetables and flowers that gardeners like to start indoors here in Minnesota, now is the time to plant those seeds. Maybe that is the reason I tend to associate St. Patrick's Day with green growing things.

I have often started seeds of Dutch white clover indoors at the end of January in order to grow my own seasonal houseplant by March 17, since the plants sold in stores as "shamrocks" are really South American oxalis. It's one of my little pet peeves about how the day is marked, which I have written about in this 2017 blog post.

The other thing that bugs me a little — but just a little — is how the emblematic greenery is often depicted as a four-leaf clover, when the whole reason for its association with the good saint is the folklore claiming that he used the plant to teach his followers about the Holy Trinity. Never mind that there's no evidence whatsoever that he ever did that, it's just that it's so missing the point about shamrocks and St. Patrick's Day.

Patrick is the subject of a lot of historical misinformation, including in his own telling of his story, says historian Roy Flechner in his 2019 book, Saint Patrick Retold. Flechner argues that Patrick was never captured and enslaved, that he made up that story as a cover for his flight from inherited onerous duties as an imperial officer in Roman Britain. You can read a good overview and summary of the book on the publisher's page here, and an excellent review in the Irish Times here.

As to Patrick's own version of his story, known as The Confession of St. Patrick, you can read it for yourself on this website, and view facsimiles of the earliest versions known. The elegant Latin text makes me think of asemic writing: Both aesthetically pleasing and meaningless (to me). 

Seeing Asemic: Patterns Everywhere 

Image from Post, a blog of the Museum of
Modern Art

Because the Latin text has no meaning for me, my attention is drawn to its decorative form, the patterns created by its marks. While all asemic writing mimics the form of regular writing, some artists copy the form of printed works almost exactly.

For example, Argentinian artist Mirtha Dermisache (1942–2012) created "asemic versions of the daily newspaper, maintaining the layout, but substituting illegible characters," hence highlighting the patterns formed by the headlines and columns of text, wrote Peter Schwenger in the book I mentioned last week, Asemic: The Art of Writing. 

With that sort of thing on my mind this past week, I began noticing the text-like patterns in seemingly random things, like my scarf . . . 

and the seeds in a bell pepper . . . 

and my half empty latte.

My heightened awareness of patterns that resemble asemic writing got me to thinking about the tendency we humans have to not only see patterns, but to imbue them with meaning, as if they contain some message from the divine. You know, like, "Today I saw X and I believe that god/the universe was telling me something." An article I read some while back on the web journal Psyche nicely describes this phenomena, called apophenia.  

From Leiden Medievalist Blog

About that Latin Text

There is something about Latin text and other hand-lettered archaic languages that carries an air of mystery, don't you think? It evokes a magic spell or incantation, mainly because we don't understand it, and because that ancient script looks so fanciful and mysterious, especially if you've read any historical fiction set in medieval times. 

Both because I have read those kinds of historical mysteries, and because of all that asemic writing stuff echoing in my head, I pounced when I spotted a review of the book Textual Magic: Charms and Written Amulets in Medieval England, by Katherine Storm Hindley (Chicago, 2023). 

By "pounced" I mean I read the review, not that I bought the book. I'll wait for it to come out in paperback, or become available from my library. But the review by Tom Johnson in the London Review of Books provides an excellent overview. 

In medieval Christian Europe, the written word was highly venerated, from the opening lines in the Gospel of John to amulets made of text written on parchment believed to have the power to protect and otherwise benefit the one who holds it. Johnson describes these as a kind of "charm magic," that is, "words and rituals that invoked supernatural power, whether divine or arcane, in order to gain protection, medicine and secret knowledge." 

The kinds of things people wrote down included "holy verses, sacred names, symbols, runes and pure nonsense." If that last part doesn't describe asemic writing, I don't know what does.

Apparently, the more undecipherable the writing, the better its magical properties; so while Latin was the primary language of these charms, they also incorporated lots of  "Greek letters, Hebrew, runes and all kinds of luxuriant gibberish," plus "sham alphabets, pseudo-writing and non-signifying marks." 

Fittingly, the author traces the decline in use of these written charms to the rise in literacy. "As more people came to be able to read, . . . it became harder to maintain the idea that writing contained occult power." 

Now I am thinking about a new variation in my 100-Day Project: asemic amulets.

Department of Oops: Pi Day on The Useful Calendar Planner 

My husband discovered a mistake in my planner this week. He wondered why I had put the pi symbol on March 12. I quickly checked all versions of the calendar, and the planner is the only one with the misplaced pi, which would have happened after I copied the calendar grid from the desk version and placed it into the planner document, then dragged it across because the planner calendar spans a two-page spread. I didn't notice that pi was left behind in that motion. I would actually be a little surprised if I managed to make all versions of my calendars without any mistakes! I tell myself that it will please the people who enjoy catching other people's mistakes.

It also reminded me of a custom I was told about when I took a quilting class many years ago, that of the "humility block." Traditionally, quilters were supposed to deliberately include one block in their quilts that contained a mistake, because only God is perfect. I thought at the time that it was a convenient "rule," and  I was certain I wouldn't need to do it deliberately.

But apparently the "tradition" is nonsense, as related in this excellent blog called Willy Wonky Quilts. 

On My Work Table

It's all quiet in Sharon's Compendium-Etsyland now, but the week started out with a mini flurry of orders over the weekend. Well, three orders, actually, but two of them had multiple items that I needed to make, so that kept me busy through Thursday. 

While I welcome the business, I really do, I'm looking forward to getting back to playing at my asemic projects, both doing some painting and drawing of the patterns I photographed last week, and playing around with those amulet charms. I also have a meeting with my art exchange group on Friday, and I've been pondering how I might incorporate some asemic writing into my coffee-and-tea themed Artist Trading Cards for that. 

I'll show you what I come up with next week, as well as whatever asemic marks I manage to put on paper.

A Shamrock by Any Other Name ...

Last year's clover, in a sweet little vase from Catherine Reece pottery.

Perhaps because St. Patrick's Day occurs so close to the vernal equinox, I get a little preoccupied with shamrocks and clovers and other green growing things. 

It's the month when many Minnesota gardeners are getting ready to start seeds indoors, and although I feel the same urge, I haven't done much seed starting for quite a few years. I did plant some cilantro seeds in a peat pot a couple of days ago (they're sitting in a south window, waiting to germinate), and that may be the extent of it for me this year.

Some years I have started seeds of white clover, Trifolium repens, at the beginning of February in order to have a pot of them in time for St. Patrick's Day. I've even written about it here and here.

These are not the "shamrocks" you see in the grocery stores about now. That plant is a type of oxalis, aka sorrel, that does not grow wild in Ireland or any other part of the northern hemisphere. But it makes a much nicer houseplant than do the clovers, so I guess the greenhouse growers figured, why not?

Oxalis at Seward Co-op today, in a display with Irish oat bread. Note they're not calling them shamrocks.

The plant identified as a shamrock by a plurality of the Irish (46%  in a 1988 survey) is lesser trefoil, aka hop clover, aka several other common names, aka Trifolium dubium, which is a bit smaller than white clover and has yellow blossoms. Although not as well known as white clover, it is, apparently, about as widespread. Native to Europe and Central Asia, it's been introduced and naturalized in North America, Africa, and New Zealand. 

Phinney the Galway cat (at least, that's where his name comes from) with my watercolor illustration of T. dubium, one of the Irish shamrocks. (Phinney's much more interested in the pencil than the art.)

Now that I've been studying this plant a little, I'm pretty sure I've seen it in many of the grassy strips between the sidewalk and street (which we call the boulevard here in Minneapolis, an apparent idiosyncrasy of my city). It's considered invasive in many areas, but not always because it is a problem for native species; more often, it is said to "invade" lawns. But since lawns aren't exactly natural ecosystems, that's not really saying much. 

Some photos of T. dubium show the plant with much rounder slightly bluish leaves, but that could be a case of mistaken identity, since there are a few look-alike species, as this site explains. 

The reason I've tended to favor white clover (T. repens) as the shamrock, even though it was the runner-up to lesser trefoil in the fore-mentioned survey (at 35%), is because the seeds are easy to come by; and that's because it used to be considered a desirable addition to lawn grass seed mixtures; and that's because it's a legume, as is  T. dubium, and so "fixes" atmospheric nitrogen, which means that it makes it available for other plants to take it up, which makes the grass healthier and greener.

Now it's most often considered a weed by those who prefer a manicured grass-only lawn, an aesthetic that emerged after WWII and the introduction of broadleaf weed-killers, according to historian Virginia Scott Jenkins in her book, The Lawn: A History of an American Obsession (published by Smithsonian Books in 1994). 

In other words, it became a weed once there was an herbicide that could kill it. In fact, the target plants were plantain and dandelions, with clover being an innocent bystander, but in order to sell the chemicals to the public, the makers had to convince them that clovers were weeds too.  

Except now it's finding its way back into the good graces of those who prefer a low-maintenance, diverse lawn that's much prettier than a boring grass carpet. Clover is also very much appreciated by butterflies and bees (including several non-stinging wild bees), mammals* (yes, that includes rabbits, you bunny haters), and birds (who eat the seeds).

My recently completed watercolor of T. repens

Clovers are also edible to humans, offering both protein and carbohydrates. In fact, according to the comprehensive history by Charles Nelson in his book, Shamrock (Boethius Press, 1991), the earliest observations about shamrocks in Ireland, reported by literate visitors, were that the Irish ate them.

And that, not anything St. Patrick did with them (if he did), is the most likely reason shamrocks have become the emblem of Ireland.


* Fun fact—Other wild animals that consume white clover:

Leaves and flowers are eaten by grizzly bears, moose, mules, deer, blue grouse and the white-footed vole.

Seeds are eaten by these birds: northern bobwhite, bufflehead, American coot, several different grouse, the horned lark, mallard, gray partridge, greater prairie chicken, willow ptarmigan, American pintail, California quail, and American robin.

Many butterflies use them as caterpillar nurseries, including the eastern-tailed blue and several sulfurs and skippers. Still more butterflies visit clover blossoms for the nectar.

 (From Encyclopedia of Life)

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Not Much Green on this Gray St. Patrick's Day

A little tip: If you want to grow your own clover for St. Patrick's Day, you should probably start the seeds on the 1st of February, and not the 11th, as I did this year. My notes from previous years did suggest that six weeks' lead time would be about right, but I just wasn't thinking about it at the beginning of February. Perhaps I'll try putting a reminder into my computer's calendar for next year.

Even so, any little bit of green is a welcome site on this gray day with sleet pelleting our windows and plenty of dirty snow still on the ground. And I am quite pleased that the little cyclamen and orchid plants I bought a few weeks ago are still sitting pretty in Grandma's old china. Those wee baby clover are nestled into a handmade porcelain cup by Minneapolis artist Dyann Myers, which I bought a few years ago in the spring at the St. Paul Art Crawl.

I have three little pots of clover; perhaps I'll transplant them to an Easter basket after today. They should be positively robust by the 20th of April.