Witch Hazel

Another plant with vague references to witches

There are four kinds of witch hazels, two native to eastern North America and the two native to eastern Asia are those more commonly found in British gardens. The flowers here are the Japanese witch hazel Hamamelis japonica arborea with its four spikey crinkled little scented yellow petals and is one of the few shrubs flowering now.

Witch hazel's name is thought to be derived from early American settlers who used this plant's forked branches as a divining rod in their searches for water or gold, just as the hazel's branches were used in England. It is also possible that the name was transferred from the English wych-hazel, or wych-elm, with its ultimate origin in the Old English word wican, meaning "to yield". The reference, of course, would be the springiness of the wood.

According to some legends witches sometimes used hazel twigs to find water and so the phrase “witching” for water became used for divining for water. The witch hazel branches seemed to resemble hazel which was regarded to have magical powers. During this very wet winter few people need a divining rod to find water.