> Can anyone direct me, please, to a source that throws light
> on the religious connotations of the yew trees found in so many
> English churchyards? The Concise Columbia Encyclopaedia
> makes a cryptic claim that yew trees have been associated
> with death and funeral rites since antiquity. If so, how? There
> is nothing in either Larousse on Mythology, or Fraser's
> Golden Bough on the subject.
Dear Ron,
I believe Giraldus Cambrensis notes the existence of yews in Irish
cemeteries in the 12th century. I remember reading somthing about
this years ago (of course, I forget the source), but they are also
apparently found in Brittany. Yews are also apparently impossible to
date very easily, because the way they grow does not result in a
complete pattern of tree rings.
Cheers,
Jim Bugslag
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