Plant of the week: Poisonous plant is a symbol of deceit

Name: Darnel (Lolium Temulentum)

Otherwise known as: Cheat, Drake, Ray Grass

Habitat: An annual member of the Graminaceae family growing up to 30cm in moist pastureland and native to southern Europe. It has the traditional, tightly-formed grass blades but is distinguished from other grasses by its long glumes containing large, black grains that spill onto the surrounding area and are gathered in with the commercial crops. The seeds are toxic.

What does it do: Darnel was known to the ancients and was used by the Greek physicians employed by the Romans as a topical treatment for skin parasites and diseases such as scabies and ringworm, and was applied to the eruptions caused by scurvy and scrofula. The Arab physicians applied poultices to compound fractures to draw out the bone splinters.

Gerard describes the effect of Darnel poisoning as resembling ‘…falling intoxication, followed by the vomiting, verbal nonsense, tremors and finally the bloody flux’.

The French call the plant Ivraie from the word Ivre – drunkeness, Darnel in Old French meant stupefied.

Everywhere, the plant is a symbol of deceit. In the Parable of the Tares in the New Testament the practice of disgruntled farmers casting the seeds over the pasture when being evicted from the property is described so it would contaminate the crop of the next tenant.

It was not unknown for brewers to add Darnel to the beer to accelerate intoxication.

Modern European farming methods have almost eradicated the plant, but it can still be found in the eastern Mediterranean.