Lords And Ladies is a polite name for…

What? The beautiful and alien looking Arum Maculatum, a native of much of northern Europe, lurker of the dark, dappled shady places. This incredibly common plant with its strikingly sculptural flower like spathe, elegant spotted leaves and brilliant scarlet berries unsurprisingly has many common names in the British Isles – and some of them are distinctly suggestive! Here is a short list of local names given to this plant:-

Cuckoo pint, Jack-in-the-pulpit, Devils and angels, Naked boys, Snake’s meat, Cows and bulls, Adders root, Wake robin, and my all time favorite…Willy lily!

The word “pint” in the common name “Cuckoo pint” is considered to be a shortening of the old English word “Pintle”, which refers to a certain portion of a gentleman’s anatomy. For those not familiar with British slang, the word “Willy” in the name “Willy lily” fulfills the same purpose. I absolutely love it that Lords and ladies has been considered a prim Victorian name for the plant, coined by those who couldn’t bear to say the cruder ones. And I love it that there is a counter argument, that if you look at the flower and how it is made you could easily say that calling it Lords and ladies is actually ruder still (If you are innocent of mind, think about human anatomy and what makes the boys different from the girls. What were those Lords and ladies up to?). No matter, these plants are, as my mum would say, “common as muck” and don’t care what you think they look like. I would love to coin a new name for them, but all the best ones seem to have already been taken.

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