Willow

The Willow in Ancient Egypt


 * Egyptian Name:**

//Tcheret// or //Tjeret//

The Egyptian Willow //(Salix aegyptiaca)// was used in ancient Egypt by carpenters for fashioning furniture, tent-poles, chariot parts, and the handles of tools. In basketry the willow played a minor role, with wicker ware beginning to appear in Egypt only in Roman times. The leaves, seeds, and other parts of the plant were used in medicine. In the Hearst Medical Papyrus willow bark was used for pain relief, and willow seeds are recommended for "cooling the vessels," and for "cooling a bone after it has been set."

The tree was sacred to the god Osiris because it was a willow which sheltered his body after he was killed, and in which the god's soul perched in the form of the Bennu bird. The Metternich Stela makes a connection between the willow tree and the Bennu bird: "You will not die from the poison's burn, for you are the great Phoenix who was born on the branches of the willow tree in the princely house of Heliopolis." Many towns had tombs where a part of the dismembered Osiris was believed to be buried, and all of them had associated willow groves. Willow leaves strung together into garlands have been found with the mummies of Ahmose, Amenhotep, Tutankhamen, and in many other graves. Since the New Kingdom, willow garlands wrapped around the heads of mummies appear to have been the "Crowns of Justification" which the deceased wore as a mark of identification with Osiris, who wore a garland of willow in the Hall of Ma'at.

A festival of the god Amun, called "Raising the Willow," was held each year that assured that the fields and trees of the land would flourish: "I offer you the willow. I erect before you this branch of the Temple of the Sistrum. One makes you the Feast of Drunkenness in the place which you love with the very great of your Majesty. I have erected for you that which belongs to you at the beginning of the first month of the season of summer, and you took delight in it." Willow branches were often part of offering garlands and the gods were adorned with willow crowns, as an inscription on the wall of the Temple of Hathor at Denderah intimates: "O divine spirits, come in joy playing the tambourine continuously, the women are delighted, the inhabitants of Denderah are joyful, the goddesses are adorned with crowns of willow."

The Trees of Ancient Egypt