The familiar and distinctive silverweed (Potentilla anserina) was for a very long time a plant of enormous significance to Scots. In fact it became a life-saver in the dark days of famine and the Highland Clearances, as Ruairidh MacIlleathain explains
Seachdamh aran a’ Ghàidheil
Lorgar am brisgean ann am mòran cheàrnaidhean de dh’Alba, air cluaintean is lòintean, air machraichean is ri taobh rathaidean, agus tha e furasta aithneachadh le a chuid duilleagan airgid. Tha ainm a’ dèanamh tuairisgeul air fhreumh brisg a bha na bhiadh cudromach do na Gàidheil thar linntean (a dh’aindeoin ’s gun robhar ag ràdh gur e ‘biadh shìthichean’ a bh’ ann.) Mus do nochd am buntàta ann an Alba, bhiodh cuid a’ fàs a’ bhrisgein a dh’aona-ghnothach, mar a bhiodh treubhan air cladach an iar Ameireagaidh a Tuath le lus eile a tha dlùth-chàirdeach dha. Thathar an dùil gur dòcha gun robh am brisgean air a chleachdadh, gun stad, gach bliadhna bho linn meadhanach na cloiche gu ruige an naoidheamh linn deug nuair a mhair cuid beò air, às dèidh gun deach am fuadachadh bhon dachannan. Goirid às dèidh Blàr Chùil Lodair, bha droch bhliadhna ann an Tiriodh a bh’ air a cuimhneachadh mar ‘Bliadhna nam Brisgeanan’. Air sgàth a’ chogaidh, cha do chuireadh sìol mar bu chòir agus chùm na daoine iad fhèin beò air a’ bhrisgean a bha a’ fàs far am bu chòir bàrr a bhith.
Gu math tric, bhiodh an lus seo cudromach as t-Earrach nuair a bha biadh eile a’ fàs gann. Bha e
air a chomharrachadh, mar sin, mar ‘Brisgean beannaichte an Earraich, seachdamh aran a’ Ghàidheil’. Thathar a’ smaoineachadh gum b’ iad na sia arain eile aran-coirce, aran-eòrna, aran-seagail, aran- peasrach, aran-cruithneachd agus aran-milis. ’S e am freumh a-mhàin a bhìte ag ithe – air a bhleith airson aran no brochan a dhèanamh, no air a ghoil (uaireannan le siùcar) no a ròstadh, ach bhathar a’ cleachdadh nan duilleagan airson tì a dhèanamh, airson brògan a lìnigeadh no airson clò a dhathadh buidhe. Thathar dhen bheachd gu bheil am blas car ‘cnòthach’ no coltach ris a’ churran-gheal. Ann an Tiriodh, tha aithris ann bhon fhicheadamh linn gum biodh cuid de na bodaich a’ fùdarachadh an fhreumh’ is ga smocadh nan cuid phìoban, ged nach eilear ag innse an robh e cho math ris a’ Bhogey Roll no Black Twist!
A life-saver
The silverweed is known as brisgean (‘BREESH-kun’, ‘brittle one’) in Gaelic, referring to its roots which were widely used as a foodstuff in Scotland over a very long time (it might well have been in use continuously from Mesolithic times into the modern age). Despite being viewed as a ‘fairy food’, it was indispensable to humans at times of food shortage. Victims of clearance, particularly in the islands of the west – where it’s one of the common machair plants – sometimes survived near the shore for a period on silverweed and shellfish.
It‘s remembered in Gaelic tradition as ‘Blessed silverweed of the spring, the seventh bread of the
Gael’, as it was regularly eaten in spring when food supplies were running low. The root was powdered to make bread (the other six ‘breads’ probably being oat, barley, rye, pease, wheat and gingerbread) or porridge. The root was also boiled (sometimes with sugar), roasted or singed above peat embers. Some people liken the flavour to nuts, others to parsnip. Like some of the tribes of the Pacific North
West of North America, the Gaels sometimes, in the days before the introduction of the potato, grew silverweed like a crop. Under these circumstances, the plant grows larger than normal, both above and below the ground.
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