Sambucus ebulus L., Dwarf Elder

Account Summary

Growth form and preferred habitats

A stout, robust, rhizomatous, herbaceous perennial with annual, furrowed stems growing up to 2 m tall and dying down again each year, S. ebulus can most readily be separated from the very common, woody S. nigra (Elder) by its much larger and more conspicuous leaf stipules. The fruit of Dwarf Elder is a small, globose drupe (ie containing a stony fruit layer), 4-5 mm in diameter borne in clusters of as many as a hundred on reddish pedicels of varying length so that the erect fruiting head is almost flat-topped. When ripe, the fruits are purplish-black, not very shiny and are crowned with the rough stump of the floral remains (Lang 1987). The berries are ripe from mid-September to late October and are fairly juicy, with purple-staining fluid. They are sweet and taste much like elderberries, but this herbaceous elder species carries its black berries erect, not drooping as in S. nigra. Each fleshy fruit 'drupe' contains three or four hard-coated seeds (ie stones or 'pyrenes'), individually 2.5-3.0 × 1 mm, yellow in colour and 3-sided (triquetrous), with a netted, wrinkled surface on the outer curved side of the fruit stone (Lang 1987).

Aerial shoots of S. ebulus do not appear until early summer in B & I, the large pinnate leaves with four or five pairs of lanceolate, finely-toothed leaflets and broad, ovate, toothed stipules at their base, resemble those of common umbellifers, and have a strong, unpleasant smell. The disagreeable leaf odour may well have been the origin of an alternative English common name, 'Danewort', from 'dain', meaning 'to stink', rather than the legendary and widespread notion that the plant grew on sites from the blood of slaughtered Danes (Vickery 1995), or of English victims of Danes (Lang 1987).

Flowers are produced in large, flat-topped, umbel-like inflorescences from mid-July to late August, each flower having a corolla of five white, creamy-pink tinged petals and stamens with strongly contrasting purple anthers. Pollination is carried out by a variety of small insects (Garrard & Streeter 1983).

S. ebulus occurs in hedgerows, field margins, on roadside verges, stream banks and waste ground, including along railways, old abandoned trackways, old clay-pits or abandoned quarries, mainly on limestone or base-rich soils. It cannot withstand regular annual mowing on roadside verges. Nowadays, it is generally sparse, usually present only in small numbers or patches in widely scattered sites, although locally it can form dense thickets on account of its creeping rhizomatous growth year on year. In many of its current sites, it was very probably originally planted, since previously Dwarf Elder was cultivated for medicinal purposes, being used in much the same way as the very highly valued Elder (Garrard & Streeter 1983; Lang 1987).

Over very many years of cultivation, in some cases probably lasting centuries, it became widely naturalised, being regularly found near habitation or in and around the ruins of old religious foundations, or planted in churchyards. It is regarded by some gardeners as handsome enough to be grown in herbaceous beds today (Brewis et al. 1996). Although over a long period of time S. ebulus has disappeared from many previous sites across B & I, in numerous instances, it has displayed quite remarkable powers of persistence once it has fully established in a site (Webb & Scannell 1983; Lang 1987).

This is a plant that is much more prevalent in N & C France, and visitors on holiday may see it much more readily there than in most parts of B & I, though there are a few exceptions (Stace & Crawley 2015).

British and Irish status

With regard to status, it is certainly an introduction in Ireland, where it has been recorded in 36 of the 40 VCs (An Irish Flora 1977; Cen Cat Fl Ir 2). In Britain, Clement & Foster (1994) accepted Dwarf Elder as native, "with reservations", but G.T.D. Wilmore (in: Preston et al. 2002) now accepts it is an early naturalised introduction, ie a pre-1500 AD archaeophyte species.

Fermanagh occurrence

S. ebulus has been recorded in just seven Fermanagh tetrads, five of them with post-1975 records, so it is rare and might possibly have been overlooked to some extent in recent surveys. Apart from the first record listed above, the details of the other sites are: "Temple Nafern" (ie Templenaffrin), just E of Belcoo, 1900, W. West; SE corner of Castlehume Lough, Lower Lough Erne, 1947, MCM & D; Galloon Bridge, Galloon Island, Upper Lough Erne, 1953, MCM & D; near old church, Inishkeen, southern outskirts of Enniskillen, Upper Lough Erne, 1990, F. Carroll; just N of old church, Templenaffrin, Belcoo, 12 October 1997, RHN & HJN; still there 20 April 2009; on 4 October 2010 it was surviving having been badly trampled by cattle; meadow to S of road and bridge, Clonatty Bridge, 1 km E of Magheraveely, 24 July 2003, RHN; Tullynagowan/Beagh Big ASSI meadow, 1 May 2006, RHN & HJN.

Most of the Fermanagh sites are on roadsides, hedges or waste ground adjacent to large estates or near churches, from which it is assumed to have escaped from cultivation. The shrub is known to persist for many years when it becomes established either through being planted or bird-sown and naturalised (Lang 1987).

Irish occurrences

The association with old churches or ruins in Fermanagh is matched elsewhere in Ireland. FNEI 3 recorded the species at Grey Abbey and Inch Abbey, both in Co Down (H38), so in the distant past the monks may well have cultivated and used the plant for medicinal or culinary purposes. In the RoI, S. ebulus is very thinly scattered across the island, but has a greater density of occurrence in Co Limerick (H8), Co Clare (H9) and N Tipperary (H10), where it is fairly widespread and is locally common, on occasions growing lush, abundant and tall on roadsides, roadside banks, in pastures and on waste ground (Webb & Scannell 1983; Reynolds 2013).

British occurrence

S. ebulus is an infrequent, scarce to rare species in most areas of Britain, but since it was formerly quite widely cultivated for medicinal purposes, it remains thinly and widely scattered nevertheless. The New Atlas hectad map displays a somewhat greater frequency occurs across S England and SW Wales. The species becomes increasingly sparse north of a line drawn on the hectad map between Hull and Liverpool, and it is rare and sporadic more or less everywhere in Scotland, and certainly N of Kirkcudbright and Renfrew (Clapham et al. 1987). There have been declines fairly well everywhere in Britain, but most significantly towards the north of England and in Scotland (G.T.D. Wilmore, in: Preston et al. 2002).

European and world occurrence

S. ebulus has a European southern-temperate distribution but, in addition to its native range, is widely introduced as an archaeophyte, long-cultivated and frequently naturalised. It is especially frequent along roadsides on the continent (Grigson 1955, 1987). It is considered native throughout most of the rest of Europe from the Netherlands to N Ukraine and the Black Sea southwards. It is also considered indigenous in W Asia, eastwards to the Himalaya (Clapham et al. 1987). It is present in Madeira, but is recognised as a definite introduction there, formerly cultivated for medicinal purposes (Press & Short 1994).

Toxicity and uses

The species has long been used in herbal medicine as a purgative and emetic. The berries contain saponin, resin, bitters and traces of a cyanogenic glycoside, but fortunately toxicity is very low and there are no recent reports of poisoning in either humans or in animals, including cows, which appear to eat the plant with complete impunity (Lang 1987; Cooper & Johnson 1998).

Names

The genus name 'Sambucus' is a Greek or ancient Latin name for the Elder tree, said to be derived from the Latin 'sambuca', the name of a stringed musical instrument, like a harp, which was supposedly (but highly unlikely) made of Elder wood (Johnson & Smith 1946) (see the current author's Sambucus nigra species account on this website). The Latin specific epithet 'ebulus' is a name in Pliny and Virgil for this plant (Gilbert-Carter 1964). There are 13 English common names listed by Grigson (1955, 1987) and Vickery (2019) mentions an additional two, 'Blood-elder' and 'She-elder'. Many of these names are linked to the notion that the plant was either introduced by Danes, or grew where Danes or their battle victims' blood was spilt. Thus several names mention either 'blood' or 'Danes' as a word-element, as in 'Dane's blood', 'Blood-hilder', 'Danewort', 'Danwort' and 'Dane weed', together with other related versions of spellings.

This belief was apparently also known in Scandinavia. In May 1741, Carl Linnaeus, the Swedish taxonomist, was invited to visit a field where little else grew but Cynoglossum officinale (Hound's-tongue) and a mysterious plant that locals called 'Mannablot' (ie 'Man's blood'), again with mention of a battle and blood of Swedes and Danes, but which turned out to be common Ebulus or Sambucus herbacea (Vickery 2019).

Grigson (1955, 1987) says the remains of the plant or its fossils have frequently been reported from Neolithic and later archaeological settlements in Switzerland, and he speculates that it may have been collected (or cultivated?) for its dyeing properties, or perhaps for its purging medicinal virtues that were already known at the time. Dioscorides, the ancient Greek physician, c 40-90 AD, knew the plant and it was also familiar to the Romans, the Dacians and the Gauls who all valued it for its purging properties, and for treatment of ailments such as gout, dropsy and bite wounds, and also for use in dyeing things black, including as a hair treatment.

In Britain, the Anglo-Saxons knew of the plant and its uses (Grigson 1955, 1987). Also known as 'Dwarf Elder', Culpepper (1653) in his English herbal, The English physician enlarged, mentions how on account of its creeping underground root (or stem), "where being once gotten into a ground, it is not easily gotten forth again". He also knew the plant as 'Wall-wort', or 'Walwort' from the Old English 'Wealhwyrt', and he was aware of its purging qualities. 'Wealh', means 'a foreigner' so 'Wealhwyrt' meant 'Foreigner plant', which is a bit mysterious and might suggest the plant was imported.

Old scattered colonies of Dwarf Elder do manage to long-persist and are often associated with graveyards where they were previously planted in the belief that being in holy ground they gained a more powerful medicinal or magical action. On the other hand, graveyards represent another form of disturbed ground, like roadsides, and this may also help explain the occurrence of the species around churches (Grigson 1955, 1987).

Threats

None.

References

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