Blackthorn and Hazelwood History & Uses

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About our Sticks | Irish Blackthorn | Irish Hazel | Selecting Stick Size and Style | Sticks, Cudgel, Shillelagh |Medicinal Qualities and Other Uses |Folklore |Droghedy's March | Links

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About our Sticks While many walking sticks are bought by people who require them for physical support, many others are bought as presents and by ambulists, or collectors of walking sticks. Each walking stick shown on our pages is one of a kind and is not part of a series. Each individual stick is numbered and photographed; our customers can select the exact stick that will be shipped.

The traditional sustainable forestry technique of coppicing to produce the raw material for walking sticks is practiced. Cut in winter, the walking stick is then seasoned for one year before being straightened and finished by hand.

Why is Blackthorn becoming harder to come by? Recently it is becoming increasingly more difficult to obtain sticks due to a shortage and even more difficult again to find thicker sticks or those with knob handles. This is due in large to the new EU regulations which forces many farmers throughout Ireland to cut their blackthorn hedge grows down to a minimum size regulation.

Heart Health

Walking is an ideal form of exercise. It requires no equipment or expense and is one of the best ways for you to become more active. Regular walking can improve confidence, stamina and energy, and help control your weight. It can also keep your heart strong, give you more energy and help reduce stress! A Walking Stick is a good companion to bring along on your hike and health walk. Sign up for our email LollySmith Newsletter and get updates when new sticks arrive!

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Blackthorn: Prunus spinosa, is a relative of cherries and plums. Sloe, the blue-black fruits are edible, but bitter until after the first frost. The Rosaceae (rose) family. The name for the blackthorn in Ogham, a language used by the Druids, is straif, the origin of the word "strife" and is about Conflict.

Blackthorn Flower

Known as a winter shrub/small tree, Blackthorn reaches an ultimate height of 13ft (4m) tall. Hedge height is 3-10ft (0.9-3m). It is mainly used as hedging and grows to produce dense impenetrable thickets. The mass of snow white flowers blossom March through April, before the oval leaves appear, followed by purple sloes in autumn.

With sharp thorns it provides cover for birds and small mammals. It attracts numerous insects in early spring and is the food plant of no fewer than 200 species of moths.

The thorny black branches are very sturdy and have been used over the centuries for teeth of hay-rakes, marquetry, and walking sticks.

The favorite Shillelagh or walking stick material today is blackthorn, that sacred Celtic wood. It is referred to as a "plum" wood, as it bears tiny flowers and is related to the plum-giving family. The vicious thorns, according to experts, must be smoothed completely down in an ordinary cane but this is not the case with shillelaghs. A nice knobbly bit is left where each thorn is severed from the cane.

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Irish Hazel: Natural smooth finish, sturdy but extremely light-weight. Round "root knob" handles copper tipped.

"Hazel rarely grows tall enough to be considered a tree, rather it forms into dense scrub in limestone areas such as the Burren, Co. Clare. Hazel has been a valuable resource to human kind since prehistoric times.

The young bark has a characteristic mottled appearance and the leaves are large and soft to touch. Nuts ripen in October and are favoured by Squirrels, Jays, Pheasants and Wood Pigeons.

Hazel wood was used to ward off evil, in water divining, and nuts were carried for good luck. They are also associated in Celtic myth with wisdom. There are also many stories that tell of Hazel wands able to bring about shape shifting and transformation.

There are also many folk customs associated with Hazel. Small twigs could protect from lightening or shipwreck at sea. In Wales, Hazel wands worn in a hat would bring you your hearts desire. Irish cattle were singed with Hazel rods as they were driven through the fires of Bealtaine."

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Stick Size: Standing in a comfortable, relaxed position have someone measure the distance between the crease in your wrist, where you would wear a watch, to the floor. A slight bend in the elbow is good. 35 - 37 inches seem to be the average size for Blackthorn sticks. Most people find it to be a comfortable length.

A few people have told us they've cut an inch or so off the bottom to bring their stick down to a more suitable size: The copper or rubber ferrule may be salvaged to use again if removed carefully. If the ferrule is damaged or no longer fits after alterations, a replacement rubber or metal tip can be found here Walking Stick Accessories

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Where did the name Shillelagh originate? The Irish shillelagh "sail-éílle"- pronounced "shahll-AY-luh" and commonly pronounced as "shuh-LAY-LEE" means "walking stick" or "cane" in Gaelic.

"A picturesque village, set among the foothills of the Wicklow Mountains, Shillelagh was a reknowned centre for oak production and supplied the timber for many famous buildings and the British navy. Quiet and unspoilt, the village now hosts an annual oak festival each June Bank holiday weekend. It is held to celebrate the huge oak forests that once dominated the surrounding area, which also gives its name to the world-famous Shillelagh stick." ...Russ and Bridget Haggerty

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What is the difference between a walking stick and a shillelagh? "A true shillelagh hasn't existed since they ran out of oak in the shillelagh forest. That many years ago any walking stick would have been called a 'shillelagh' by an Irishman. It had become their word for a walking stick. Since then, they began making sticks out of blackthorn for the simple reason that they make really strong walking sticks. I suppose, in the early days, the strength was important since they were for self-defense.

In the days of Sherlock Holmes, a gentleman carried a stick to defend against the riff raff. Some of those sticks had a large head that the owner would drill out and fill with molten lead (ouch). Doyle makes a point of saying that Sherlock was an excellent 'single-stick' fighter.

I consider the blackthorn walking stick to be the rightful inheritor of the name 'shillelagh'. It goes back far enough in history and has the usefulness to be worthy of the title.

There you are, more confusion to keep the argument going - that's Irish, we don't really want a definitive answer - takes all the fun out of it." ...Russ and Bridget Haggerty

Irish Stick, Shillelagh, Cane, Cudgel, Bata:

Was Blackthorn the wood of choice for weapons? Blackthorn draighneach is the traditional wood to make fighting sticks, because, like other woods in the Rosaceae family, it is tough and hard. The traditional Irish shillelagh, bata in Gaelic - which means, fighting stick or cudgel is one example of a weapon made with this wood.

Stick Fighting

"Bata" is the word for a short club or fighting stick; note its resemblance to the word "baton"- that is what "bata" means. It's also where we get our word "bat".

"Irish boys were given a short shillelagh and began training in the native martial art of Ireland, shillelagh fighting. During adolescence, boys were considered to attain manhood when they finally receive their first full-length shillelagh. The shillelagh became a right of passage, and so does training to fight with it. In fact, this Irish martial art is one of the oldest martial arts on earth, competing easily with the ancient boxing or stick styles of Sumer, Egypt and India. The name for this art is "Bataireacht Sail-Éílle", literally "Cane-battle" (modern pron. "bah-TAH-reht shall-AY-luh")"...Rev. Fr. Antonio Hernandez

"I haven't found any other material that compares to the Blackthorn for its ratio of hardness to lightness with a natural feel. I've tried about a dozen different types of materials, woods and metals, and it seems that the Blackthorn stick ranks as the best overall. The best thing about them are their proportion of weight to strength and their flexibility."...GMaster Leon Crowely. Crowley Martial Arts.

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Medicinal Qualities: The Medicinal Blackthorn Sloe

qualities of the blackthorn's edible,(but bitter until after the first frost) blue-black fruits, which resemble minature plums, gives us the sloe berry. They were first used by herbalists, to help in the treatment of stomach troubles, and in the dealing of blood disorders.

The Sloe berry is a relative of cherries and plums and is also used for making of wine and the flavouring of the alcohol beverages of gin, vodka, or poteen. Sloe gin is made by adding some sugar to a full bottle of sloes, topping up with gin and leaving for as long as possible before drinking.

Blackthorn leaves were dried and mixed with tea leaves in what became known as Chinese tea. Despite their sour taste the sloe is made into a paste is excellent for whitening the teeth and removing tartar. The thorns provided blackthorn ink, the bark a red dye for wool and linen.

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Folklore: Blackthorn is said to have supernatural associations. In the folklore of Ireland, the Blackthorn was thought a magical shrub, because the "little people" are said to dwell there. It is considered unlucky to cut down the tree, but the careful use of the Blackthorn's many useful properties is said to bring good fortune.

Irish Blackthorn Walking Stick

It is said the Blackthorn blooms on Christmas Eve, and thought by many that the crown of thorns placed on Christ’s head during the Crucifixion came from the blackthorn.

Though beautiful, it's said the flowers are thought unlucky if brought into the house, or worn in the buttonhole.

Lunantishees are the Fairy tribes that guard the blackthorn trees or sloes; they let you cut no stick on the eleventh of November (the original November Day), or on the eleventh of May (the original May Day). If at such a time you cut a blackthorn, some misfortune will come to you.

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Droghedy's March: The Irish Droghedy's March from county Wexford as described in 1812 by Patrick Kennedy in "On the Banks of the Boro"

The tune called Droghedy's March was occasionally danced to among the hornpipes, by a performer furnished with a short cudgel in each hand, which he brandished and clashed in harmony with the tune. But we had the good fortune to see it performed in a complete fashion on the borders of the barony of Bargy, in the old manor-house of Coolcul, whose young men , joined by the stout servants and labourers on the farms, were well able, in country parlance, to clear a fair. Amongst these the present chronicler was initiated into the mysteries of mumming, and was taught to bear his part in that relic of the Pyrrhic or Druidic dance, "Droghedy's March."

We practiced it in one of the great parlours, and this was the style of it's execution: six men or boys stood in line, at reasonable distance apart, and six others stood opposite them, all armed as described. When the music began, feet, and arms, and sticks commenced to keep time. Each dancer, swaying his body to the right and left, described an upright figure of 8 with the fists, both of them following the same direction, the ends of the sticks following the same figure, of course. In these movements no noise was made, but at certain bars the arms moved rapidly up and down, the upper and lower halves of the right-hand stick striking the lower half of the left-hand stick in the descent of the right arm, and the upper half of it in the ascent, and vice versa. At the proper point of the march each man commenced a kind of fencing with his vis-a-vis, and the clangs of the cudgels coincided with the beats of the music and the movements of the feet. Then commenced the involutions, evolutions, interlacings and unwindings, every one striking at the person with whom the movement brought him face to face, and the sounds of the sticks supplying the hoochings in the reels....

The steps, which we have forgotten, could not have been difficult, for we mastered them.....This war dance is (or was) performed to a martial tune resembling Brian Boru's march... [Pp.231-32]

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Links: Customers in the UK and elsewhere will be interested in a website selling fine hand carved Walking Sticks in native hardwoods. See the 'magical' walking stick he crafted for the film "Nanny McPhee".

Please visit Crowley Martial Arts. Schools of Self-Defense, Fitness and Agility.

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