Harvest of Broom Bushes
Between the End of Autumn and the Beginning of Winter
By this temperate zone seasonal harvest lunar calendar, in some years broom only lasts a day, in some years broom lasts a month. It all depends on whether it is a 13 month year, or a 12 month. The broom harvest is the time to make a new broom, and the time to sweep your house clean so that the next year is fresh.
Some say the word getal is metaphorical for reeds, but the ogham series records that getal is metaphorical for broom-bush. In the tree-ogham series, n-getal stands for "ng", being represented by three strokes athwart the trunk-line. The thirteen letter in the tree-ogham series is n-getal.
N- is an Irish pronoun, originally deriving from na, and n- in Irish means of. For example, the phrase expressing freely in Irish is a n-aisge, where n- means of and aisge means a gift.
This is related the Irish use of na h- to mean of the. For example, of the forest in Irish would be na h-frith. Another example would be cuid na h-oidhche, a night's entertainment, which literally means portion of the night.
Geata, in both Scottish Gaelic and Irish means gate. In Middle Irish the word for gate is geta. In Anglo-Saxon the word for gate is geat. It is easy to see how the modern English word for gate derives.
Geadhail, in Scottish Gaelic means a ploughed field. Geadhail is pronounced "gethal". Geadhail comes from the same root as gead, and gead means the bed of a garden, or a spot of arable land in Scottish Gaelic.
Considering the above, n-geadhail would mean of a ploughed field. In the same way, n-geta would mean of a gate.
The time to harvest bare-stemmed broom-bushes, once used extensively all over Europe to make brooms, comes at a time when the geese are flying south overhead, the deer and goats are mating, the salmon are spawning, and the oaks are dropping their acorns. It is the time of Samhain, winter's beginning and summer's end, the Celtic new year. The New Year's time is a time of sweeping the old year away, making a fresh start. The association of brooms to this time of year, and the making and use of brooms in general, is quite apt.
In Dutch and German, the common broom-bush is called besom. The Latin name of the common European broom-bush, genista, is associated with the word genesis and generate. Various species of Genista grow throughout Europe, the Mediterranean area and western Asia. breed, Latin, genus - to beget, Indo-European, genu
It was the Latin word for broom which was used to name the genus of this plant group. Some various broom species in the genus Genista are Irish Broom, Scotch Broom, French Broom, Portuguese Broom, and Spanish Broom. Other broom-bushes of different genus and species grow all over the globe. There native brooms in California and native brooms in other regions of North America.
The picture on the right is wrong. Brooms are deciduous perennials, and broom bushes at this time of year have lost their leaves. They look like upside-down green brooms with their handles planted in the ground. However the green pliable stems must be clipped from their branches to be used for brooms. They may look like upside-down broom sticks, but they won't pull out of the ground. Their root system is just as large as their visible branches.