Middleton Woods #3: Blue Magic
This is the 3rd of a short series of 5 caches hidden in these beautiful ancient indigenous 45.8 hectare broadleaf woodlands just north of Ilkley. They join several existing caches providing additional incentive (if needed!) to visit this special - magical - place.
To Reach the Cache:
Park @ or near N 53 55.955 W 1 48.881 adjacent to Ilkley Suspension bridge and make your way into the woods where you will find myriad trails enabling you to make your way around easily.
See Gallery for a map of the woods showing main trails, parking spots and the approximate locations of this series of caches.
The sight and scent of a bluebell woodland is a joy that many look forward to every year. In late April and through most of May, bluebells cast a haze of enchantment in woodlands like Middleton Woods, beguiling our senses and persuading some to believe once more in magic.
As well as being a source of food for many species of insect, the flowers have long been associated with truth and love in mythology. As one of the most iconic British flowers, it is no surprise that folklore surrounds them - although for such a lovely flower, much of the folklore is somewhat ominous . . .
- Bluebells ring when fairies are summoning their kin to a gathering; but if a human hears the sound, they will be visited by a malicious fairy and die soon after
- It is unlucky to trample on a bed of bluebells, because you will anger the fairies resting there.
- Bluebell woods are enchanted - fairies use them to lure and trap people in their nether world
- If you turn one of the flowers inside out without tearing it, you will eventually win the one you love
- If a child picks a bluebell in a bluebell wood, they will never be seen again
- Wearing a garland of bluebells will induce a person to speak only the truth - maybe it could be tested on some of the current world leaders?
- In the 16c a distillation of the bulb was given to choristers by choir masters to prevent a boy’s voice from breaking
- Until the 1970s, the bluebell’s Latin name was Endymion non-scriptus. In Greek legend, Endymion was a beautiful but mortal youth who was lulled into an eternal sleep by his lover, the moon goddess Selene, so that he would never grow old and die.
- In the language of flowers it symbolises everlasting love (constancy), and humility
Poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson spoke of bluebell juice being used to cure snake-bite and said they resembled 
'the blue sky, breaking up through the earth', while John Keats said the bluebell was the 'sapphire queen of the mid-May' and is said to have believed it symbolised solitude and regret.
The Bluebell by Emily Brontë (1818 - 1848)
The Bluebell is the sweetest flower
That waves in summer air:
Its blossoms have the mightiest power
To soothe my spirit’s care.
There is a spell in purple heath
Too wildly, sadly dear;
The violet has a fragrant breath,
But fragrance will not cheer,
The trees are bare, the sun is cold,
And seldom, seldom seen;
The heavens have lost their zone of gold,
And earth her robe of green.
And ice upon the glancing stream
Has cast its sombre shade;
And distant hills and valleys seem
In frozen mist arrayed.
The Bluebell cannot charm me now,
The heath has lost its bloom;
The violets in the glen below,
They yield no sweet perfume.
But, though I mourn the sweet Bluebell,
‘Tis better far away;
I know how fast my tears would swell
To see it smile to-day.
For, oh! when chill the sunbeams fall
Adown that dreary sky,
And gild yon dank and darkened wall
With transient brilliancy;
How do I weep, how do I pine
For the time of flowers to come,
And turn me from that fading shine,
To mourn the fields of home!
The bluebell’s scientific name is hyacinthoides non-scripta - it is a hyacinth, related to irises and orchids. But it actually takes its name from ancient Greek mythology, the epithet ‘non-scriptus’, which means ‘unlettered’ or ‘unmarked’ intended to distinguish it from the classical hyacinth of Greek myth, which was said to have sprung up from the blood of the dying prince Hyacinthus.
It is not to be confused with the harebell, to which Shakespeare referred in Cymbeline, which is unrelated and which is prevalent in Scotland.
It is the flower of St George, as it usually starts to bloom around St George’s Day on 23rd April. In a 2015 Spring poll by botanical charity Plantlife, bluebells were voted the favorite wild flower of England.
See here for a piece on bluebell folklore including fascinating background on the origin of some of the many names of this beautiful flower.