Welcome to the first Aelfen newsletter. Every two months I'll share a little of the old plant lore — the stories our herbs carried long before they carried price tags — plus what's new in the shop.
Returning to the dark: the underworld's mint
The underworld had a herb of its own. Minthe was a nymph of the Cocytus, the river of the dead, and when she boasted of Hades' love she was crushed into the dust of the underworld floor — and from that dust sprang mint, sweetest when it's stepped on. Her queen was Persephone, who ate six pomegranate seeds below and so must return below for six months of every year: that, the Greeks said, is why winter comes. At Samhain, when the veil thins and we set a place for the beloved dead, mint belongs with them — the herb that grew in the land of the dead and came back sweet.
Under the red thread
In Ireland and Scotland, the rowan is the protection tree. A sprig of rowan berries, with their tiny five-pointed star, tied with red thread and hung over the door kept the household safe on the nights when the otherworld pressed close — Samhain above all. Never cut a rowan without asking; the tree was a guardian, not a resource. If you hang one thing this week, make it rowan.
Every season has its dreaming herb
Mugwort is the Samhain dream herb — tucked by the pillow for vivid dreams when the dead are near and, in the old stories, talkative. Our Samhain stories on Instagram are walking through the season's herbs day by day this week, if you'd like to follow along.
New in the shop
Our four holiday gift sets are live — the Yule Hearth, the Dreamer's, the Protection & Threshold, and the Apothecary Cabinet — packed in our Aelfen boxes and ready for the season. And through November 17, herbs are 20% off when you take three or more on the website.
Shop the season: https://aelfen-apothecary.com
Hard to find — like all the best herbs
Some herbs are just hard to find. They hide in old gardens and older stories, and half the shops that list them don't truly have them. One of ours is hiding in this very letter, in plain sight. Read the first letters of the three story headings, from the top. First reader to email us the herb gets a free packet of it with their next order — because around here, the hard-to-find ones are the point.
Thank you for reading, and for keeping the old stories alive with me.
— Sara
Aelfen Apothecary · aelfen-apothecary.com
P.S. Have a shop, studio, or treatment room? Aelfen is wholesale now — details here: https://aelfen-apothecary.com/pages/wholesale