and more distantly, Devon.^22 Could these two distribution patterns be the
legacy of population movement between Wales and Ireland?
Nowhere in the British Isles does there seem to have been such high
regard for the virtues ofUmbilicus as the Isle of Man—according to one
source^23 it was esteemed throughout the island as late as 1860—but neither
corns nor chilblains feature among the ailments for which is has been
recorded there; instead, only bruises,^24 scalds,^25 felons^26 and erysipelas^27 find
mention (though it may also have been the lus-ny-imleig valued for a womb
ulcer^28 ). Intriguingly, the inclusion ofUmbilicus among the nine or ten ingre-
dients in a special poultice for erysipelas^29 was shared by the island with
Donegal.^30 In Skye,^31 where that plant was also valued for erysipelas, it was
used in the belief that it drew out the ‘fire’ from the affliction.
As is usually the case with folk herbs enjoying a strong reputation for
effectiveness for certain purposes, these two have also attracted to themselves
a tail of miscellaneous other uses.Sempervivum is on record in Britain for
insect and nettle stings in Kent^32 and Gloucestershire,^33 croup in Norfolk,^34
asthma in Lincolnshire^35 and fevers in the Highlands.^36 The only singleton for
Britain produced by Umbilicus,on the other hand, is a record as a treatment
for epilepsy in some unspecified part of the west of England^37 ; though attrib-
uted to ‘herb doctors’, that record may have been derived from reports in the
medical press a decade earlier by a general practitioner in Poole, Dorset, of a
dramatic improvement in that affliction brought about by the juice of this
plant.^38 Its use had been suggested to the general practitioner in question by
someone who had read of this in a magazine article, which in turn presum-
ably drew on a folk medicine source.
Surprisingly, the sole uses exclusive to Ireland in terms of the records
traced are confined to that same miscellaneous tail. Surprisingly, too, though
Umbilicus is by far the more plentiful of the two plants in that country, the
Irish uses of that for which only single records have been turned up—for
tuberculosis in Wicklow^39 and jaundice in Waterford^40 —are outnumbered by
their Sempervivum equivalents: for headaches in Roscommon,^41 for worms as
well as kidney trouble in Cavan^42 and as an abortifacient in Mayo.^43 Though
Sempervivum has yielded the only Irish records of its employment for cuts
(Cavan,^44 Carlow^45 ),Umbilicus beats that with the only ones for its applica-
tion to sore eyes (Leitrim,^46 Wicklow^47 ) and as an earache cure (Mayo^48 ). But
as a treatment for lumps and swellings,Sempervivum not only has a monop-
oly of the records traced for Ireland but a widely scattered distribution in
that role as well (Londonderry,^49 Leitrim,^50 Wicklow,^51 Carlow^52 ).
Currants, Succulents and Roses 137