Also called Verbena officinalis, verbenaca, hierabotane, holy herb, herb of grace, common vervain
Vervain is a slender wild verbena that the Romans counted among their holiest plants: Pliny says it was carried by envoys, used to cleanse the table of Jupiter and swept through houses to purify them. Modern practitioners still use it as a cleansing and protective herb.
TraditionRoman religion and European folk magic
RegionMediterranean and northern Europe
Era1st century CE to present
Moon☽ Waxing moon
DayFriday · Venus
ElementEarth
Difficulty●○○ Simple
Time20 minutes
Tonight's moon is read when the page loads.
The working
Tie a few vervain stems into a small brush with thread. Wear gloves if your skin is sensitive to plants.
Stir the salt into the bowl of water and dip the vervain brush in it. Say what you are clearing out of the house, such as an argument or a long illness.
Starting at the back of the home, lightly sprinkle water from the brush along doorframes and windowsills, the way Pliny says houses were purified with it.
Wipe the table you eat at with the cloth and a little of the vervain water, echoing the Roman cleansing of Jupiter's table.
Finish at the front door, then open it for a minute to let the air change.
Pour the leftover water outside onto soil, not down the sink, and hang the brush to dry by the door until the next cleaning.
Take care: Vervain is for sprinkling and hanging in this working, not for drinking: herbal references advise against taking it during pregnancy, and it may interact with medicines. Some people get skin irritation from handling the plant, so use gloves if you react, and keep the water away from pets that might drink it.
Versions across time and place
i
Envoys' herb and Jupiter's table
Roman state religion · Republic and early Empire
Pliny writes that no plant had wider fame among Romans than verbenaca. Envoys carried it when treating with enemies, the table of Jupiter was cleansed with it, and houses were purified and expiation made with it. Scholars note that his plural verbenae could also mean sacred greenery in general rather than one species.
Uses: verbena sprigs
Recorded in: Pliny the Elder, Natural History 25.59 (Bostock and Riley translation)
ii
Gathered at the Dog Star
Gallic soothsayers and magicians reported by Pliny · 1st century CE
Pliny says people of the Gallic provinces used the plant for soothsaying, and that magicians claimed it won friendship and cured every disease. They said it must be gathered around the rising of the Dog Star when neither sun nor moon shone on it, after an offering of honeycomb to the earth, with a circle traced around it in iron. Pliny himself calls these claims follies.
Uses: honeycomb offering, iron tool
Recorded in: Pliny the Elder, Natural History 25.59
iii
Holy herb of the Cross
Medieval Christian folklore · Middle Ages
A medieval legend said vervain was used to stanch Christ's wounds after he was taken from the cross, which earned it the name holy herb. It went into ointments meant to drive out illnesses thought to be demonic.
Uses: vervain, a spoken blessing
Recorded in: Verbena officinalis, Wikipedia; The Cloisters Gardens blog, Holy Vervain
History
Common vervain, Verbena officinalis, is a wiry plant with tiny lilac flowers that grows on dry ground across Europe. Its genus name comes from the Roman word verbena, a term for the most powerful sacrificial herbs. In Book 25 of his Natural History, written in the 70s CE, Pliny the Elder calls it hierabotane, the sacred plant, and says that envoys carried it, that Jupiter's table was cleansed with it and that houses were purified with it. He also reports Gallic soothsayers using it for prophecy.
Christian Europe kept the plant holy by giving it a new story: that it had stanched Christ's wounds. Names such as holy herb and herb of grace followed, and vervain turns up in medieval charms against fever and witchcraft. The Cloisters, the Metropolitan Museum's medieval garden in New York, grows it for this reason. Wicca and modern witchcraft treat vervain as a cleansing and protective herb, and the television series The Vampire Diaries gave it a new fame as a guard against vampires.
