num_pages: 339
description: Ever since the first human settlements 10000 years ago weeds have dogged our footsteps. They are there as the punishment of 'thorns and thistles' in Genesis and  two millennia later as a symbol of Flanders Field. They are civilisations' familiars invading farmland and building-sites war-zones and flower-beds across the globe. Yet living so intimately with us they have been a blessing too. Weeds were the first crops the first medicines. Burdock was the inspiration for Velcro. Cow parsley has become the fashionable adornment of Spring weddings.Weaving together the insights of botanists gardeners artists and poets with his own life-long fascination Richard Mabey examines how we have tried to define them explain their persistence and draw moral lessons from them.One persons weed is another's wild beauty.
language: English
title: Weeds: How Vagabond Plants Gatecrashed Civilisation and Changed the Way We Think About Nature
publisher: Profile Books