Witches, weather and wonderful singing? Trees in northern folklore

This National Tree Week, Dr Katie Liddane delves back into the local folklore collections for a look at the traditions and beliefs that people in the 19th-century North East held about trees. 

Trees are obviously very important to us now and the wooded areas of the Tyne Derwent Way make for lovely walks all year round, but they carried different meanings for people of the past including: methods to predict the weather, protection from evil spirits, and even making sure that a baby would grow up to be a skilled musician!

Being able to predict the weather was incredibly important to 19th-century folk, especially in the more rural areas so they could plan what to do with crops and know what to expect of the growing conditions. However, seeing as daily weather forecasts weren't published until 1861, people developed other methods of anticipating what was to come. Known as 'weather lore', some of these methods have stayed with us today - for example, 'red sky at night, shepherd's delight. Red sky in the morning, shepherd's warning', meaning that an especially red sunset is a sign that the next day will be dry and sunny. 

Folk in the North East also applied this weather lore to the trees around them. William Henderson, writing in 1866, tells us how the people of the North East would try to forecast the summer weather by observing which trees came into leaf first. There was even an accompanying rhyme!

If the oak's before the ash,

You will only get a splash;

If the ash precede the oak,

You will surely have a soak.

As you can see, people would watch oak and ash trees, waiting to see if the oak would sprout its leaves first and bring with it only light rain, or if the ash would win the race and signal a downpour for the summer ahead. Have a look this spring and see what's on the cards!

William Brockie notes that the ash was amongst a number of trees that had 'reputed anti-witch properties'. The elder tree was also on this list, with Brockie saying that:

All 'knowledgeable persons' are agreed that the tree is obnoxious to witches, because their enemies use the green juice of its inner bark for anointing their eyes; and any baptised person whose eyes are touched with it can see what the witches are about.

Rubbing elder tree juice in your eye to see witches is definitely not one we recommend, but a more harmless witch-related piece of tree lore is that a branch of rowan tied with red thread was believed to protect a person or household from evil spirits!

Lastly, Brockie also includes a stranger tradition held about the ash tree that we can't quite see the logic behind! He states that it was believed that if a baby's fingernails are cut before they turn one, they will become 'light-fingered' or a thief. The ash comes in here as, if the baby needed their nails trimmed before their first birthday, the mother would need to bite them and the first cuttings should be buried under an ash tree to make the child a famous singer or musician. We can neither guarantee results, nor recommend biting baby's nails!

So there we have it, some weird and wonderful tree folklore from generations past to mark The Tree Council's National Tree Week and the start of this year's tree planting season.