People used to believe that holly bushes protected tombs and other monuments from lightning strikes. Ivy springs up naturally to cover English tombs, but Americans who transplanted it to their graveyards decided that it meant friendship and, like most cemetery plants, also immortality. A symbol of worldly accomplishment and heroism, given not by God, but by one's peers. The virgins' flower and also the symbol of resurrection and purity. A belladonna relative whose roots grow in the shape of a man.
Mandrake is believed to spring from the lifeforce of the interred.
Lively imaginations hear a shriek when it is pulled from the ground. Germans used to make dolls from the tuber and keep their creations in little caskets. Like the laurel and the bay, the evergreen myrtle represents achievement. It also suggests eternal life. Mighty oaks act as conduits for lightning, bringing the explosive will of electricity-packing sky gods to earth.