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The Apple Tree Man is the name given to the spirit of the oldest apple tree in an orchard and is found across Old English folklore, particularly in the South West. The health and fertility of the orchard is thought to reside within this figure.
The fatherly figure is either an elder of the fae folk that has become treelike or a tree that has awakened to protect his ilk. In some traditions he passes immortally from orchard to orchard. Apple Tree Man is often depicted as old but muscular with apples growing from his hair.
The legend is bound up with customs of orchard wassailing, in which locals give thanks to the apple trees for their harvest. On Twelfth Night, men would go singing song under lamplight with their wassail bowl into the orchard and poor cider over the tree roots.
Meanwhile women and children would lay slices of toasted bread and sometimes tie them to the branches.
Folklorist Ruth Tongue collected stories of the Apple Tree Man in the cider-producing villages of Somerset. In one story a man offers his last mug of mulled cider to the trees in his orchard on Christmas Eve. He is rewarded by the Apple Tree Man
who reveals to him the location of buried gold, more than enough to pay his rent for the year ahead.
In another tale a farm cat was curious to explore some fields that were said to be haunted by ghosts and witches. She got as far as the orchard when the Apple Tree Man cautioned her to return; folk were coming to pour cider for his roots and shoot guns to drive away the witches.
He persuaded her not to go wandering around at night until a fictional ‘St. Tibb's Eve' and she never did as St. Tibb's Eve never came.
Apple Tree Man may be seen as a midwinter version of other male harvest figures of English and Welsh custom, such as the Green Man, Jack-in-the-Green, the Green Knight and Green George.
These pagan figureheads of nature worship proved so abiding they are often seen carved into Christian churches and graveyards, as early missionaries tried to adapt local beliefs so as to persuade new converts.
Revival wassails have sprung up in recent years in the Westcountry, with the ritual held at Clevedon Community Orchard becoming very popular.
Images:
Tree carving in Fordwich, Kent
Apple Tree Man, @andypaciorekart
Apple Tree Man, Alan Lee
Thatchers Sandford wassailing festival, 2018
'Wassailing of the Apple Trees' artist unknown, 1913
Tree carving in Fordwich, Kent
Apple Tree Man, @andypaciorekart
Apple Tree Man, Alan Lee
Thatchers Sandford wassailing festival, 2018
'Wassailing of the Apple Trees' artist unknown, 1913
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