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Celtic tree calendar · Celtic tree month 5

Willow

Willow · Saille

Willow (Saille), month 5 of the modern 'Celtic tree calendar', 15 April – 12 May.

The willow, a tree of water and the moon, bends without breaking and roots readily from cuttings. In the tree calendar it stands for intuition, flexibility and the feminine, and for the moist growth of spring.

The thirteen tree months come from Robert Graves' The White Goddess (1948), not from ancient sources. The tree associations of the Ogham letters do go back to medieval Irish scholars, but there is no evidence for an ancient Celtic tree calendar.

Personality

intuitive · flexible · sensitive · artistic · patient · lunar

In the modern 'Celtic tree calendar', a person born in the Willow month (15 April – 12 May) is described as intuitive, flexible and sensitive, with a strong connection to the moon and to water. The tree months are a modern invention, drawn from Robert Graves' The White Goddess (1948), not a Druidic calendar; Willow corresponds to the Ogham letter Saille.

Modern books derive the Willow personality from the tree that grows beside water, bends without breaking and roots readily from cuttings. Willow people are said to be imaginative, emotionally perceptive, artistic and resilient, with good memories and a capacity to adapt to changing circumstances. Their challenges are described as moodiness, melancholy, a tendency to hold on to old hurts and a sensitivity that makes them easily hurt.

In love Willow people are portrayed as tender, devoted and attentive to their partners' feelings; in work, as artists, poets, healers and counsellors who rely on intuition. The willow's link with the moon and the feminine, prominent in modern Pagan symbolism, reflects nineteenth- and twentieth-century reinterpretation more than ancient Celtic sources.

Sources and further reading