Gloggod Tree

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crataegus

"The Scots saying "Ne'er cast a cloot til Mey's oot" conveys a warning not to shed any cloots (clothes) before the summer has fully arrived and the Mayflowers (hawthorn blossoms) are in full bloom.

The custom of employing the flowering branches for decorative purposes on 1 May is of very early origin,

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"The supposition that the tree was the source of Jesus's crown of thorns doubtless gave rise around 1911 to the tradition among the French peasantry that it utters groans and cries on Good Friday, and probably also to the old popular superstition in Great Britain and Ireland that 

 ill luck attended the uprooting of hawthorns.

 Branches of Glastonbury thorn (C. monogyna 'Biflora', sometimes called C. oxyacantha var. praecox), which flowers both in December and in spring, were formerly highly valued in England, on account of the legend that 

 the tree was originally the staff of Joseph of Arimathea."

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'Serbian folklore that spread across Balkan notes that hawthorn

 (Serbian глог or glog) is essential to kill vampires,  

and stakes used for their slaying must be made from the wood of the thorn tree.

In Gaelic folklore, hawthorn (in Scottish Gaelic, sgitheach and in Irish, sceach)  

'marks the entrance to the otherworld' and  

is strongly associated with the fairies.

 Lore has it that it is very unlucky to cut the tree at any time other than when it is in bloom; however, during this time, it is commonly cut and decorated as  

a May bush (see Beltane).

 This warning persists to modern times

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The superstitious dread of harming hawthorn trees prevalent in the British Isles may also be connected to an old belief that hawthorns, and more especially ' 

lone thorns' (self-seeded specimens standing in isolation from other trees) 

 originate from lightning or thunderbolts  

and give protection from lightning strikes.

Hawthorn trees are often found beside clootie wells;  

at these types of holy wells, they are sometimes known as rag trees 

, for the strips of cloth which are tied to them as part of healing rituals.

 'When all fruit fails, welcome haws' was once a common expression in Ireland.

According to a medieval legend, the Glastonbury thorn, C. monogyna 'Biflora', which flowers twice annually, was supposed to have miraculously grown from a walking stick planted by Joseph of Arimathea at Glastonbury in Somerset, England.

 The original tree was destroyed in the sixteenth century during the English Reformation, but several cultivars have survived. 

 Since the reign of King James I, it has been a Christmas custom to send a sprig of Glastonbury thorn flowers to the Sovereign, which is used to decorate the royal family's dinner table.

In the Victorian era, 

 the hawthorn represented hope 

 in the language of flowers."

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crataegus