Lords and Ladies
Arum maculatum
Cuckoo pint. Wake robin. The names are all innuendo and none of them are wrong.
Overview
Lords and ladies has more folk names than almost any other British plant — cuckoo pint, wake robin, jack in the pulpit, parson in the pulpit, naked boys, starch root, adam and eve — and most of them, examined with any care, are anatomical. The plant earns this. The spathe, a pale green sheath, enfolds a purple-brown spadix — the clubs of the poker — in a structure whose sexual resemblance was obvious to every generation that lived close enough to plants to notice such things, and amusing or scandalous depending on the century and the company. The plant is also, every part of it, armed with calcium oxalate crystals that cause immediate and severe burning of any mucous membrane they contact, a quality that presumably discouraged the more credulous from acting on the resemblance.
Botanical Notes
A tuberous perennial emerging in early spring with arrow-shaped, glossy, dark green leaves often blotched or streaked with purple-black. The spathe and spadix appear in April to May — the hooded green spathe surrounding the upright, purple-brown spadix, which generates heat and a faint carrion scent to attract pollinating insects. After pollination the spathe withers, leaving a spike of green berries that ripen through orange to scarlet-red in late summer. Found in shaded woodland, hedgerow bases, and damp shaded gardens throughout Britain and Europe. All parts contain raphide crystals of calcium oxalate and, in the berries, additional alkaloids — the combination makes it one of the most common causes of accidental plant poisoning in Britain.
Lore & History
The starchy corm was used as a source of starch in Elizabethan England — Portland arrowroot, as it was known, was made by repeatedly washing the grated corm to remove the toxins and then drying the starch. It was used to stiffen the elaborate ruffs of Elizabethan fashion, and later as a food starch in the Channel Islands during food shortages. The processing involved was laborious and the result hard on the hands of those doing the washing, which was noted in contemporary accounts without, apparently, prompting a search for a better source. In folk medicine the corm was used externally as a poultice for skin complaints — the calcium oxalate effect on skin being counterintuitively less severe than on mucous membranes.
Warnings
All parts toxic. The calcium oxalate crystals cause immediate, intense burning of the mouth, throat, and gastrointestinal tract on contact — this effect is so rapid and so unpleasant that serious poisoning from eating the plant is unusual in adults, but children attracted to the red berries are at risk. Symptoms include oral burning, swelling, excessive salivation, nausea, and vomiting. In severe cases, swelling of the throat can obstruct breathing. Do not plant where young children play. Seek medical attention if any part is ingested.