the corner office

It's bluebell season, they're pretty and they're everywhere. Anywhere half-shaded - under random trees and along hedgrerows and pavements - and woodlands obviously. But it's hard to find the magical places where they're really abundant, stretching as far as the eye can see.

This is the third spring since I started walking, and this time of year is now all about finding bluebell patches (and lambs, but that's for another day). I have dozens and dozens of photos from my excursions, but even the best woods never look quite as good in photos as they do in real life. These aren't bad, though.

I'm aware that this blog could fast become subtitled Weather, Words and Walking, but just one more: why aren't they called purplebells?

One theory online is that the word purple wasn't around at the time that bluebells were named, but it turns out that's not true; in English, apparently, the word purple is even older than the word blue. Some argue that many bluebells are in fact blue (not if you look at these photos, or any bluebells I've ever seen), but the most plausible explanation is that over time the colours represented by the words "blue" and "purple" have changed a bit.

I'd asked Ronwen the purplebells question and she'd said (with some patience) "I don't know, I'd say they're a little more violet, anyway," which wasn't a very satisfying answer, "ok, why not call them violetbells then?" But therein a hint that this inconsistency has been part of my life for, like, ever. It was only after mulling it over a bit further that I realised: when was the first time I'd encountered the verse "roses are red, violets are ... blue!!?".

This verse comes from a 16th century poem, and well, yes. People clearly considered violets to be blue. And so no stretch for bluebells to be blue, too. Now I no longer lie awake at night wondering why they're not called purplebells or violetbells, and instead I lie awake wondering how I'd managed to go through almost my entire life familiar with the line "violets are blue", without ever questioning it.