Yews: Symbol of Immortality, Death and Rebirth

"The forested landscape described by the courts of the High King of Tara as being iurach, or abounding in evergreen yew trees, was raised to the ground.

Cut down the forest. Cut all the forest down--and you destroy the spiritual life of a woodland culture. This is called genocide, the systematic destruction of a cultural group, blow-by-blow."

- Diana Beresford-Kroeger

The yews were a symbol of immortality, of death and rebirth, guardians of the place between the worlds. Two of the secrets of the yew's longevity are slowness of growth and the ability to regenerate from within. As the tree ages and some of the heartwood decays, aerial roots grow down through this rich humus, take root in the ground, and eventually create whole new trunks. A circle of new trunks may grow around the original bole, which itself may collapse and decay. Thus there are very old, hollow yew trees, impossible to date by growth rings, but believed (some of them) to be upwards of two thousand years old.