The Folklore of Plants: Basil

Lisa Karen Miller

          This favorite in the herb garden adds savor not only to our food but our very lives when we learn more about it.  It comes in many colors and varieties; I highly recommend the purple to jazz up your salads and pizzas, or lemon to lift your next pasta dish.

          Considered sacred in India, it also has a long history of being precious to lovers in Italy; their men wore a sprig of basil to indicate they were engaged to be married. That makes the following story all the more poignant.

          John Keats’ narrative poem, “Isabella, or the Pot of Basil,” was adapted from a story in Boccaccio’s Decameron, which predates it by five hundred years.  It was widely known in the oral tradition for centuries before that, so it is indeed an ancient tale.

           Isabella was a young noblewoman whose family wanted her to marry a rich older man.  Predictably, she was already in love with a completely unsuitable young man, Lorenzo.  Learning of this, her brothers took Lorenzo out and murdered him, burying his body. Lorenzo then came to her in a dream and told her what had happened and where he was buried.  Rushing out into the night, she dug up her murdered lover’s head and buried it in a pot of basil, which she tended obsessively, watering it with her tears.  The basil thrived, growing large and lush.  The maiden withered and sickened until she pined away entirely.

           There are two well-known paintings by Pre-Raphaelites, William Holden Hunt and John William Waterhouse, which illustrate this ancient story. While Hunt’s is the more beautiful, it is Waterhouse’s interpretation of the story that rings more true.  His Isabella is gaunt and pale, and the garden looks dark and cold. If Hunt’s model looks a bit too healthy to be pining, there’s a good reason:  she was his very pregnant wife.

          We have long known that herbs are power packs of “good for you,” but science is now confirming this for us.  Basil is anti-inflammatory and antibacterial, as well as being a good source of magnesium and antioxidants. The eugenol and rosmarinic acid in basil boost the brain’s production of dopamine and serotonin.  According to Indian researchers, this could lead to sunnier moods in as little as three days.

           No wonder all those Italian grandmas look so happy.

© Copyright 2023 Lisa Karen Miller