Box

The common box, European box or boxwood is an evergreen shrub or small tree native to western and southern Europe, north-west Africa and south-west Asia, with paired oval leaves and highly scented, petal-less flowers. Kynes lists it under Boxwood, and says its dense foliage is often clipped into topiary. She gives earth and Mars, and a wide list of deities. She says the Greeks and Romans made boxes from it, and that in the north of England mourners carried sprigs in funeral processions. In the Middle Ages it was worn as an amulet against witchcraft and used in potions to remove hexes. A branch on the roof of a new house in Germany guarded it, and in Brittany boxwood on a cradle kept faeries from leaving a changeling. She has a branch used to comb the aura of a hex, and divination tools stored with a piece of boxwood. Cunningham has no box entry.