This site and its content are under development.

Origanum vulgare L., Wild Marjoram

Account Summary

Probably introduced, garden escape, rare. Euroasian southern-temperate, introduced in N & S America.

1903; Praeger, R.Ll.; Co Fermanagh.

April, May & November.

Growth form and preferred habitats

This rhizomatous, deeply rooted, variably hairy and rarely glabrous, tufted, herbaceous perennial has been used as an aromatic, culinary, kitchen garden plant and medicinal herb throughout B & I for centuries. The long, deep root run and very numerous, long root hairs allows the species to tolerate prolonged periods of drought. Beyond the garden wall, stems can grow up to 90 cm, although very frequently sub-optimal growing conditions limit it to much less than this, closer to 30 cm in height. The rhizome is short and sends out runners or stolons. Despite the latter ability, the species shows only a limited ability to spread laterally in most habitats. Stems are annual, slender, flushed purple, branched above, often with numerous short, sterile axillary branches, giving the plant a definite tufted appearance. Stems are woody at the base and along their length they are densely clothed with long-stalked, opposite leaves (Melderis & Bangerter 1955; Sell & Murrell 2009).

A colonist of bare or sparsely occupied, dry, infertile, calcareous soils, the range of local habitats in the Fermanagh area includes dry hedge banks, bridges, old walls with lime-mortar and rough grass on roadsides. It generally grows where there is minimal competition and little or no pressure from mowing, grazing or trampling. The distribution of the species is centred on vegetation where competition is limited by a combination of mineral nutrient deficiencies and occasional disturbance. The established strategy of the species is categorized as intermediate between C-S-R (ie a balance of all three strategies, Competitor, Stress-tolerator and Ruderal) and Stress-tolerant competitor (SC) (Garrard & Streeter 1983; Grime et al. 1988, 2007).

Variation

In Europe, the culinary herb referred to as 'Oregano' or 'Marjoram' can be one of several related species, or a hybrid or mixture of any of these species. The species include O. vulgare, O. majorana L. (Sweet or Knotted Marjoram, a widely cultivated species), O. onites L. (Pot Marjoram, a dwarf shrubby species from the Mediterranean area, also widely cultivated), O. syriacum L. and the hybrid between O. majorana and O. vulgare (Sell & Murrell 2009).

O. vulgare itself is extremely variable in the colour and indumentum of its bracts and calyx, the shape and length of the inflorescence 'spicules' (see below) and corolla colour. Four subspecies are recognised in B & I: subsp. vulgare, which is the native form in Britain and is used as both a medicinal and culinary plant; subsp. hirtum (Link) Ietsw. (= O. heracleoticum L.) (Winter Marjoram); subsp. virens (Hoffmanns. & Link) Ietsw.; and subsp. viride (Boiss.) Hayek. All four subspecies are grown in gardens in B & I and they occasionally escape (Grieve 1931; R. Fernandes & V.H. Heywood, in: Tutin et al. 1972; Sell & Murrell 2009).

Flowering reproduction

O. vulgare flowers from July to September. The inflorescence looks like crowded, terminal and/or axillary heads, each consisting of whorls of 2-several flowers grouped into short 'spicules' or spikes. These are then tightly arranged into a branched, ± flat-topped corymb, or a slightly looser panicle (branched raceme) (Webb et al. 1988). The number of flowers in a terminal or axillary inflorescence can approach several hundred (Grime et al. 1988, 2007).

Individual flowers are either large and bisexual (the majority) or smaller and female. The bracts exceed the calyx and are purple, ovate and imbricate (ie they overlap one another like roof-tiles). The reddish-purple, bell-shaped calyx, 3 mm, has five short equal lobes, spotted with yellow. The 4-8 mm corolla is pinkish to rose-purple, 2-lipped, the tube being longer than the calyx and hairy or glabrous outside (Melderis & Bangerter 1955; Sell & Murrell 2009). The flowers are highly aromatic and can attract clouds of insects, some of which carry out pollination. The flowers are protandrous and self-sterile. Four nutlets are produced per fruit, each 1 mm long, ovoid and smooth (Sell & Murrell 2009).

Germination takes place in spring in vegetation gaps, but some 'seed', ie nutlets or achenes (single-seeded dry fruits), can survive more than five years burial in soil (Thompson et al. 1997). Plants from disturbed vegetation sites display a higher incidence of male-sterility and it appears that some populations have experienced high levels of selection pressure for out-breeding. This has led to the formation of the many genetic variants observed in the species. However, in B & I, O. vulgare has a modest number of subspecies (four) and occupies a rather narrow ecological range of habitats (Grime et al. 1988, 2007; Sell & Murrell 2009).

Fermanagh occurrence

As a glance at the Fermanagh tetrad distribution map makes clear, this familiar culinary perennial is less prevalent here now than it was previously in the 1940s and 1950s. In Fermanagh, it has been recorded rarely in a total of 13 widely scattered tetrads, only six of which have post-1975 records.

The range of local habitats of O. vulgare in the VC includes dry hedge banks, bridges, old walls and rough grass on roadsides. In Fermanagh, O. vulgare has always been most frequently found growing in the lime-rich mortar of old walls. While there certainly is less of it about than before, at the same time it can occasionally become well established and long-persistent on these old walls, surviving in place for up to 50 years or more as is the case, for example, on Scarford Bridge over the Colebrooke River.

The details of the six post-1975 records are: old garden wall, Inisherk Island, Crom Estate, Upper Lough Erne, May 1989, RHN, still there May 2003; Scarford Bridge, Colebrooke River, 2 November 1989, RHN and 12 April 1996, RHN & RSF; Aghalane Bridge, Woodford River, 2 October 1998, RHN & RSF; naturalised on N wall of garden, Belleisle ASSI, Upper Lough Erne, 26 December 1999, RHN; Long Island, Lower Lough Erne, August 2001, RHN.

Fossil occurrence and status

Nutlet macrofossils identified as O. vulgare have been rarely recorded in Britain from the Hoxnian and Ipswichian interglacial periods, as well as from the late Wechselian glacial. The species has also been rarely recorded in the late stage of the current Flandrian interglacial, at Bowness Common and at Ehenside Tarn (Godwin 1975). Whether this really is sufficient to recommend the species as a native is another matter, although this is the status it is generally accorded in Britain. In Ireland, on the other hand, there does not appear to be any supporting fossil evidence and since there is a long history of culinary and medicinal use and garden cultivation of the plant, the current author (RSF) can see no credible scientific reason why O. vulgare should be regarded as native.

Irish occurrence

Regarded in NI at least as an escaped garden herb, O. vulgare has a quite widespread occurrence further south in the RoI, where it is still considered native by many botanists. While it is widely distributed in the RoI, its distribution remains rather patchy and occasional and it is only consistently found around Dublin and across parts of the Irish Midlands (Flora of Co Dublin; New Atlas).

British occurrence

O. vulgare is common in England and Wales, particularly in areas of limestone geology, but it becomes very much more local further north and is apparently absent in NW Scotland except as a very rare garden escape (New Atlas).

European and world occurrence

O. vulgare is a polymorphic species that belongs to the Eurasian southern-temperate phytogeographical element. It is widespread across a large area of Eurasia including the Balearic Isles, other islands in the W Mediterranean, plus the Canary Isles. Subsp. viride occurs across a very wide area from Corsica to E China (Sell & Murrell 2009). The species has also been introduced into both N & S America, but only to a rather limited extent (Hultén & Fries 1986, Map 1610). It has also been introduced to New Zealand (Allen & Hatfield 2004).

Uses

As indicated above under the section on variation, several Origanum species have been in culinary use for seasoning for thousands of years, but only O. vulgare has a history in herbal medicine, which goes back to ancient Greece and Rome. The rather tender Sweet Marjoram (O. majorana) of the garden was distinguished in the 16th century from the 'Common Organ', or 'Organy', also referred to as 'Wild Marjoram' and 'Bastard Marjoram', which is O. vulgare (Grigson 1955, 1987). Gerard (1597) described O. vulgare as, "exceedingly well knowne to all".

Wild Marjoram was another general 'cure-all', being made into Marjoram tea and taken, for instance, to treat indigestion, earache, toothache, cough, dropsy and bladder troubles (Grieve 1931; Grigson 1955, 1987). In ancient Greece, O. vulgare was regarded as a remedy for narcotic poisons and used to treat convulsions and dropsy. Marjoram contains about 2% volatile oil that can be extracted by distillation. The properties of the oil are stimulant, carminative (relieving flatulence), diaphoretic (inducing perspiration) and mildly tonic. It was also used as an emmenagogue, ie for stimulating or increasing menstrual flow (Grieve 1931). Externally, the dried leaves and tops could be applied as a hot poultice for treating painful swellings and rheumatism, as well as for colic. An infusion made from the fresh plant was also recommended to relieve nervous headache by virtue of the camphoraceous principle contained in the oil (Grieve 1931).

Names

The genus name 'Origanum' is the classical Greek name of an aromatic herb in Theophrastus and other early herbals (Gilbert-Carter 1964; Gledhill 1985), but it is not necessarily the same plant that we know today. Another quite different theory of origin is that the name derives from the Green 'oreos' meaning 'mountain' and 'ganos', 'joy', 'beauty' or 'brightness', a reference to the usual habitat of the plant and its attractive, perfumed nature (Johnson & Smith 1946; Hyam & Pankhurst 1995). The Latin specific epithet 'vulgare' means 'common'.

Origanum vulgare was identified with the 'agrioriganos', the wild 'origanos' of Dioscorides. The name 'Marjoram' properly belongs to the 'Sweet-' or 'Pot-Marjoram' (Origanum majorana = O. hortensis Moench.), which is taken to be the 'sampsuchon' or 'amaracon' of Dioscorides. From 'amaracon' or its Latin equivalent, came the mediaeval Latin 'majorana' or 'maiorana', Old French 'maioraine', or 'maiorane' and Middle English 'majoram' (Grigson 1955, 1974, 1987). Additional English common names include 'Joy of the mountain', 'Organ' and 'Organy' (Grigson 1955, 1987).

Threats

None.