The Green Man Unmasked: A New Interpretation of an Ancient Riddle

By James Coulter

A relic from our pagan past; a fertility symbol; the spirit of vegetation; Jack-in-the-Green, Herne the Hunter or Robin Hoodall of these descriptions and many more have been advanced to explain the identity of the strange and often outlandish image which glares so balefully from rood screen and roof boss in so many places of Christian worship throughout Western Europe. Invariably depicting a male human head, it is by any reckoning a most unusual image and while exhibiting countless variations, the predominant feature common to all is the vegetation issuing in luxuriant profusion from the mouth and coiling around the head in fantastic shapes and patterns; a feature which has no known counterpart in nature. It is the Green Man so-called by generations of environmentalists and folklore enthusiasts. But such interpretations beg the questionwhy does the image occur predominantly within a Christian context with a frequency second only to that of Christ Himself. .

Who is the Green Man and what does his widespread presence signify? The author believes that the answer to this age-old riddle may be found in a number of medieval works such as the apocryphal gospels, the Bestiary and the Legend of the Rood all of which would have been familiar to scholars and teachers of the period. Although never part of the official canon, these nevertheless had a considerable influence on the teaching of the medieval Church and the imagery which it employed to illustrate it for the benefit of illiterate or semi-literate congregations.

The present study represents a radical departure from the previously received wisdom on the subject and advances the hypothesis that far from being a pagan fertility symbol, the Green Man is a lead player in the great scriptural drama of the Creation, the Fall of Man and his ultimate redemption.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Jul 19, 2006
• ISBN: 9781467014885

James Coulter

  From his earliest memories, the author has retained an abiding fascination with the art, architecture and imagery associated with the many diverse religions to be found throughout the inhabited world.  His career with a multinational company allowed him to live in such greatly differing cultures and environments as Switzerland, Brazil, Iran and India and to travel to many others parts of our crowded planet. Common to all of our widely scattered human ‘family’ is the need to reach out to something other-worldly outside themselves and their earth-bound state.  Pyramids, temples, mosques, cathedrals or simple wayside shrines all in their different ways articulate mankind’s everlasting quest for an understanding of his origins— his place in the great scheme of things and his ultimate destiny within it. Following his retirement to Devon it is the soaring splendour of the Gothic cathedrals and churches of England which is the author’s particular love and the inspiration for the present study.

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© 2007 James Coulter. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

First published by AuthorHouse 8/1/2007

ISBN: 978-1-4208-8286-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4670-1488-5(e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2005908165

Printed in the United States of America

Bloomington, Indiana

Contents

Chapter 1: The Green Man in Myth and Legend

Chapter 2: Ancient Roots

Chapter 3; The Green Man in Company

Chapter 4: The Legend of the Rood

Chapter 5: The Plays and the Players

Preface

Just off the M4 in Wiltshire lies the village of Sutton Benger where on entering the beautiful old parish church of All Saints the visitor’s attention is quickly drawn to the arresting beauty of a carving on the west wall which eloquently invites a closer inspection. Dating from the fourteenth century, it is in the form of a human face described as the Green Man and is surely one of the most remarkable of the many-varied family of such images answering to this enigamic description and found in places of Christian worship throughout Western Europe. The finely drawn face is the face of a thinker scholar but the air of calm repose is not reflected in the eyes which, with their steady gaze, bespeak a secret sorrow. From the mouth disgorges the Green Man defining feature— a profusion of vegetation coiling upwards to form a fantastic crown of fruiting vegetation amongst which birds can be seen feasting on the berries.

To meet the gaze of the Sutton Benger Green Man is to know that this is no mere inchoate piece of sandstone cunningly carved at the idle whim of some medieval craftsman for it speaks as eloquently as any words can speak—‘I am a man: I have a name and I was placed here for a purpose’.

Over the years much ink has been spilt by numerous authors in attempting to give the Green Man a meaning and identity. In her contribution to the 1939 edition of Folklore, Lady Raglan confidently identified him as being at one with Jack-in-the-Green, Robin Hood and a host of the other ‘green’ characters of popular folklore and custom. Her interpretation found a ready resonance with readers of Frazer’s Golden Bough, then much in vogue, and more recently with the burgeoning environmental movements with whom the image has become an icon. Invoking Jungian psychology, William Anderson identified the Green Man as an archetype symbolising our oneness with the earth. None of the ingenious interpretations of the Green Man image which have appeared in recent years have fully addressed the question: why is the foliage- disgorging Green Man so prominently and almost exclusively identified with places of Christian worship? However strenuous the attempts of writers to forge for him a folkloric connection with overtones of pagan ancestry, they simply will not do for, as the second most frequently occurring image after that of Christ Himself, the Green Man is quite evidently a key figure in Christian iconography.

It was with such musings in mind that I began my own quest to discover, if I could, the secret of the Green Man in the hope that some day I might be able to meet his gaze and say, ‘I know who you are and I know why you are in ths place’

July 2005

James Coulter

Landkey

Devon

Chapter 1: The Green Man in Myth and Legend

Parish churches are surely one of the glories of England from the humblest of unpretentious little structures hidden away at the end of a country lane to the soaring splendour of those magnificent buildings which dominate the skyline of so many a town and village throughout the land—witnesses to an age of surer faiths and simpler certainties. In their many varied architectural styles and decorations they reflect the changing customs, beliefs and devotions of passing generations. Within their venerable walls they house a gallery of vernacular art and imagery unsurpassed anywhere in the world and it is the particular significance of some of this art and imagery which will be examined in the following pages.

The observant visitor exploring a pre-Reformation church or cathedral for the first time will have many things to engage his attention for these buildings were originally intended to be a visual experience reflecting the relationship of Man to God and his journey through life towards his final reunion with God. There is much to be seen that is beautiful for it was one of the precepts of the early Church Fathers that the contemplation of beauty could lead the spirit towards the contemplation of spiritual truths. But not all is beauty and some of the images of dragons, serpents and other strange beasts of indeterminate species are quite grotesque and inspire one to question the meaning of their presence in such surroundings. As the visitor’s eye takes in the legacy of medieval craftsmanship in wood and stone and glass, he may suddenly find his attention drawn to the arresting image of a human face staring back at him from screen or roof or stall. With fronds of foliage spewing in profusion from its mouth and often peering through a screen of leaves. It is the foliate head—an image commonly known in contemporary literature and folklore as the Green Man. It is mainly found on roof bosses, capitals and rood screens—in fact almost anywhere within the building including some tucked away in such dark corners that they are difficult to see and notoriously difficult to photograph. So obscurely are some placed that one is tempted to wonder if their presence signifies a purpose which does not require them to be seen. Carved in stone or wood and very occasionally depicted in stained glass, there is surely some special significance in the fact that next to that of Christ himself, it is one of the most widespread of all the images left to us from the great wealth of medieval art which would have adorned our churches before the ravages of the Puritan iconoclasts of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries ‘purified’ and robbed them of so many of these perceived symbols of superstition. Many of the images are sad; some are smiling as if they were enjoying a secret joke; some are quite fierce and some have an expression of infinite pain and sorrow. If it is mentioned at all in the church guide, it is usually described as a fertility symbol or some amusing relic of the old pagan religion or a figure of folk customs which begs the question what is such a figure doing in a place of Christian worship.

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Fig 1 Church of All Saints, Sutton Benger ,Wilts

It is by any imagining a very odd image: the foliate fronds issuing from the mouth and even eyes or ears, have no known counterpart or condition in nature and no obvious connection to any biblical or liturgical source. It is indeed an enigma which cries out for an explanation and an answer to the question; who is this Green Man and what does his presence in so many places of Christian worship signify? Heads of an immense variety and character can be found in churches of this period ranging from kings, saints or angels but the principal features which distinguish the Green Man from all other forms are firstly a head without any visible attachment to other parts of a body and secondly the disgorging of foliage from the mouth and occasionally from the nose and ears and parts of the face. Within this definition, while the principal characteristics remain, the variations on the theme are virtually endless. Whatever the meaning, the fact remains that the Green Man, together with the many strange creatures in whose company he is found, have played a significant role in Christian iconography for some four centuries. Although his origins almost certainly lie in pre-Christian antiquity, it will be the purpose of this work to suggest the Green Man’s true identity and significance within a Christian context.

In her pioneering work on the subject, Kathleen Basford identified the distribution of the Green Man image in the form in which it is most familiar to us as approximately the limits of the Roman Empire in the Mediterranean littoral and Western Europe.