Digitalis - with visiting bee.
This is also known as Foxglove, for which many suggestions exist for the derivation of the name.
Some believe that the name was in the first place, foxes' glew, or music, in reference to the favourite instrument of an earlier time, a ring of bells hung on an arched support, the tintinnabulum.
However, an alternative explanation is that the shape of the flowers suggested the idea of a glove, which may have been easily corrupted into foxglove.
The name foxglove is a very ancient one and exists in a list of plants as far back as Edward III.
The "folks" were the fairies and nothing is more likely than that the pretty coloured bells of the plant would be called "folksgloves," afterwards, "foxglove."
In Wales it is said to be a favourite lurking-place of the fairies, who are said to create a snapping sound when children, holding one end of the digitalis bell, suddenly strike the other on the hand to hear the clap of fairy thunder, with which the indignant fairy makes her escape from her injured retreat!
In Scotland it is called "bloody fingers" and "deadman's bells" whilst in Wales it is known as "fairy-folks-fingers" or "lambs-tongue-leaves".
- 4
- 0
- Canon EOS 600D
- f/11.0
- 106mm
- 3200
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