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MISTLETOE & PUSSY WILLOW (1890)
Anton Seder ed. "Die Pflanze in Kunst und Gewerbe"
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英米文学に現れるセイヨウヤドリギには，陰のイメージが付きまとう．キリスト教からすると，邪教と人身御供の残像が付きまとうからであろうか．
★ シェイクスピア（1564-1616）『タイタス・アンドロニカス』1590年前後
彼の全作品中，最も残虐で暴力に溢れているという点で異質な戯曲であり，そのため最近まで上演される機会も少なかった初期の悲劇．ローマ軍の将軍タイタスによって息子のひとりを生贄にされたゴートの女王タモーラは，新ローマ皇帝の座に就いたサターナイナスに取り入って后となり，アンドロニカス一族への復讐を開始する．タモーラとその愛人であるムーア人エアロンの策略によって，タイタスの娘ラヴィニアはタモーラの息子達に夫を殺され，強姦された上に，口封じのため舌と両手を切り取られる陰惨な場面．
“Titus Andronicus” SCENE III
TAMORA
Have I not reason, think you, to look pale?
These two have 'ticed me hither to this place:
A barren detested vale, you see it is;
The trees, though summer, yet forlorn and lean,
O'ercome with moss and baleful mistletoe:
Here never shines the sun; here nothing breeds,
Unless the nightly owl or fatal raven:
「タモーラ（息子たちに） 理由もないのに血の気が失せると思うの？
この二人（*ラヴィニアとその夫）が私をこんなところにおびき出したのよ、／ご覧、こんな荒れ果てたぞっとするような窪地に。
木々は、夏だというのに寒々と痩せほそり、／苔だの、（*baleful＝有毒な）ヤドリギだのに覆われて生気をなくしている。
ここには日の光も射し込まず、夜のフクロウとか／不吉なカラスのほかは何も棲みつかない。」
『タイタス・アンドロニカス-シェイクスピア全集12』松岡和子訳（筑摩書房，2004）
★トーマス・ギスボン（Gisborne, Thomas, 1758-1846)
“Walks in a forest; or, Poems descriptive of scenery and incidents characteristic of a forest, at different seasons of the year” (1794)
“WALK THE SIXTH. WINTER FROST.”
“Projecting wide
O'er the bare plain with horizontal stretch,
His arms enormous, girt with wither'd leaves,
And tufted still with misleto, no more
By Druid hands and golden sickle cropt,
Rear high their elbowy twistings ; and uphold
With firm support the thickly-woven spray.”
「見渡す限りあらわな原一面に，／お前の太い腕は枯葉をまとい，
まだ厚いヤドリギをつけたまま，／ドルイドの手や黄金のかまで切られることもなく，
その突兀の節くれをしっかと持ち上げ，／葉の茂る小枝をがっしりと支え持つ。」
★サー・ウォルター・スコット（Sir Walter Scott, 1771 - 1832），『アイバンホー』（Ivanhoe）は1820年に発表した長編歴史小説．
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| スコット記念碑 エジンバラ 2008年9月 |
Chapter XVII
"Why," said the knight, "did you not tell me that this water was from the well of your blessed patron, St Dunstan?"
"Ay, truly," said the hermit "and many a hundred of pagans did he baptize there, but I never heard that he drank any of it. Every thing should be put to its proper use in this world. St Dunstan knew, as well as any one, the prerogatives of a jovial friar."
And so saying, he reached the harp, and entertained his guest with the following characteristic song, to a sort of derry-down chorus, appropriate to an old English ditty.
* It may be proper to remind the reader, that the chorus of
* "derry down" is supposed to be as ancient, not only as
* the times of the Heptarchy, but as those of the Druids,
* and to have furnished the chorus to the hymns of those
* venerable persons when they went to the wood to gather
* mistletoe.
THE BAREFOOTED FRIAR.
1.
I'll give thee, good fellow, a twelvemonth or twain,
To search Europe through, from Byzantium to Spain;
But ne'er shall you find, should you search till you tire,
So happy a man as the Barefooted Friar.
そう言うと、隠者はさっそく手を伸ばして竪琴を引き寄せ、次のようなざれ唄を歌って客をもてなした。それはイギリス古歌話に独特である一種のルフランがついたものだった。
「はだしの托鉢僧」
暇ならやろうぜ、一年、二年はやすい／ビザンチンからスペインかけて／探してごろうじ、足は棒にしても／またとはいまい、愉快なことじゃ、／はだしの坊主の上こす奴は。（中野好夫訳）
★ トマス・ハーディー (Thomas Hardy, 1840 - 1928) 『ダーバヴィル家のテス』(Tess of the d'Urbervilles, 1891）
Phase the First: The Maiden
5. CHAPTER V
The crimson brick lodge came first in sight, up to its eaves in dense evergreens. Tess thought this was the mansion itself till, passing through the side wicket with some trepidation, and onward to a point at which the drive took a turn, the house proper stood in full view. It was of recent erection--indeed almost new--and of the same rich red colour that formed such a contrast with the evergreens of the lodge. Far behind the corner of the house--which rose like a geranium bloom against the subdued colours around--stretched the soft azure landscape of The Chase--a truly venerable tract of forest land, one of the few remaining woodlands in England of undoubted primaeval date, wherein Druidical mistletoe was still found on aged oaks, and where enormous yew-trees, not planted by the hand of man grew as they had grown when they were pollarded for bows.
The crimson brick lodge came first in sight, up to its eaves in dense evergreens. Tess thought this was the mansion itself till, passing through the side wicket with some trepidation, and onward to a point at which the drive took a turn, the house proper stood in full view. It was of recent erection--indeed almost new--and of the same rich red colour that formed such a contrast with the evergreens of the lodge. Far behind the corner of the house--which rose like a geranium bloom against the subdued colours around--stretched the soft azure landscape of The Chase--a truly venerable tract of forest land, one of the few remaining woodlands in England of undoubted primaeval date, wherein Druidical mistletoe was still found on aged oaks, and where enormous yew-trees, not planted by the hand of man grew as they had grown when they were pollarded for bows.
（軒まで縁の常磐木（トキワギ）におおわれたまっ赤な煉瓦の門番小舎がまっ先に目についた。テスはこれが屋敷だと思ったが、いくぶんどぎまぎしながら小門をくぐりぬけ、馬車道の曲がり角までくると、本邸がすっかり現われた。これは最近建てられたもの － 実際、新築といってもいいほどで、門番小舎の常磐木と著しい対照をなしている、同じまっ赤な色をしていた。周囲の落ち着いた色に比べてジェラニュームの花のようにそそり立っている、この屋敷の一隅のはるか彼方に、ご猟林のやわらかな藍色（あいいろ）の風景が見渡すかぎり広がっていた－まことに神々しい森で、疑いもなく原始時代からイングランドにわずかに残っている森林地帯の一つであった。ここにはドルーイド僧の崇拝した寄生木（やどりぎ）が檞（かし）の老木に今もなお見られ、人間の手で植えたのでないいちいの巨木が、弓を作るためにその頂を切られた昔そのままの姿で生えていた。『ハーディー「テス（上）」』井上宗次・石田英二訳，岩波書店 (1960) ）
★ロングフェロー（Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) “Tegner's Drapa”
米国の詩人ロングフェローは，愛した詩人 Esaias Tegnér の死を北欧神話の美しい神，バルドルの死になぞらえて詠った．
『海辺と炉辺』 (The Seaside and the Fireside. 1850);
I heard a voice, that cried,
"Balder the Beautiful
Is dead, is dead!"
"Balder the Beautiful
Is dead, is dead!"
All things in earth and air
Bound were by magic spell
Never to do him harm;
Even the plants and stones;
All save the mistletoe,
The sacred mistletoe!
Bound were by magic spell
Never to do him harm;
Even the plants and stones;
All save the mistletoe,
The sacred mistletoe!
Hoeder, the blind old God,
Whose feet are shod with silence,
Pierced through that gentle breast
With his sharp spear, by fraud
Made of the mistletoe,
The accursed mistletoe!
Whose feet are shod with silence,
Pierced through that gentle breast
With his sharp spear, by fraud
Made of the mistletoe,
The accursed mistletoe!
（泣き叫ぶ声が響いた．／美少年バルドルが／死んだ，死んだと
天地の全てのものが／彼を傷つけないと／呪文にかけられていたのに／草木も石さえも／ヤドリギをのぞいては／あの聖なるヤドリギを除いては
沈黙のくつをはく盲目の神へイダーは／あの優しい胸に突き刺した／だまされて作ったヤドリギの鋭いやりを／呪われたヤドリギのやりを）
