Rue

So green grows the laurel and so does the rue
So woeful, my love, at the parting with you
And by our next meeting our love we'll renew
We'll change the green laurel to the orange and blue.

I was singing that song this morning, and Mom and I discovered we had no idea what exactly rue might be.

So I asked Google. Turns out it's a tough, weedy sort of plant; it grows in bad soil, like a weed; it smells like a weed; if you get it on your skin and stand in the sun, it blisters you, which is a very weedy sort of thing to do; it tastes bitter like a weed; and the poets and songwriters use it to mean bitterness. It's toxic if you get too much of it and will cause miscarriages.

Nobody really eats it anymore except Italians and Ethiopians, who put it in salads, coffee, and liqueur. If you want the flavor while minimizing the bitterness, they recommend boiling the leaves for a minute and then taking them out very rapidly.

There seem to be two different sets of names for it. In the West, we mostly have variations on "rue," having got it from the Greek "rhyte" (or "reuo"--my sources disagree) by way of the Latin "rute." In the East, most of the names are connected to the Middle Persian (yay!) "sudab." I tried to look up the modern Farsi, but my skill with the online dictionary is not sufficient to distinguish between the verb "rue" and the herbal noun, and the paper dictionary was entirely silent on the subject. :-/ Speaking of which, the other English word "rue," the one about regretting, comes from the Old English "hreowen," to make sorry or grieve. So that's not related.

But I think rue used to be better known than it is now; probably because of the aforementioned poets and songwriters. We know the Pharisees tithed rue punctiliously. The Romans made a paste or sauce called "moretum" out of it. Apparently throughout ancient and medieval times, it was used as a protection against curses, the evil eye, and witches. Pliny thought it was good for the eyesight, and a modern site, I forget which one, agreed that a tea of it actually does soothe strained eyes. I'm not convinced; every other use seems to be, ah, irritating or regulatory. Rumor also has it it's good for sciatica, snakebites and poisonings, earache (if you pour the juice out of a pomegranate rind), hysterics, and keeping away fleas and disease. I believe that last one. There's also a story about four thieves who didn't get the plague and attributed their health to a concoction of rue, garlic, lavendar, and rosemary, which is a terrifying thought.

The most unexpected reference I came across was calling it the herb of grace. Grace was kind of the last thing I'd think of in connection with it, actually. Apparently, though, a week before High Mass the Catholic church would infuse their holy water with rue. That's the tradition Shakespeare is working off in Ophelia's herb scene.

OPHELIA
There's fennel for you, and columbines: there's rue for you; and here's some for me: we may call it herb o' grace o' Sundays: O you must wear your rue with a difference. (Hamlet IV.5)

Isn't that cool?