Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme
A bouquet garni of herbal histories - part I
Parsley, like its near-relative celery, is native to the Mediterranean, and the Greeks used the same word for both: σέλῑνον (selinon). One of the oldest written plant names, it appears in the form ‘se-ri-no’ in Linear B inscriptions dating from 1500 BC1; and it is found in placenames such as Selinunte in Sicily and Selino in Crete.
A Greek legend tells t…