Green Man

See also: green man

English

A Green Man carving in Sutton Benger Church, Wiltshire

Proper noun

Green Man (plural Green Men)

1. (now historical) A character in British folklore often depicted as a foliate head; any of certain similarly-depicted figures from other cultures, hypothesised to share a common folkloric or mythological root. [From 16th c.]
   • 2006, Gary R. Varner, The Mythic Forest, the Green Man and the Spirit of Nature, Algora Publishing, page 122:

     The widespread vegetation cults attest to the probability that the Green Man, in all of his guises, originated at the beginning of the agricultural age at least 7,000 years BCE. The symbolism inherent in the Green Man is a reflection of the archetypal lore of life-death-rebirth, the endless cycle seen so easily in vegetation.

   • 2006, James Coulter, The Green Man Unmasked, Author House, page vii:

     Invoking Jungian Psychology, William Anderson identified the Green Man as an archetype symbolising our oneness with the earth. None of the ingenious interpretations of the Green Man image which have appeared in recent years have fully addressed the question: why is the foliage-disgorging Green Man so prominently and almost exclusively identified with places of Christian worship?

   • 2007, Gary R. Varner, Gargoyles, Grotesques & Green Men, Lulu, page 55:

     So too do carvings of Green Men appear on and in these magnificent structures.

   • 2009, Peter Bramwell, Pagan Themes in Modern Children's Fiction, Palgrave Macmillan, page 66:

     But while carvings and buildings contain the Green Man in a rigid image, working in the open air he is at one with the greenwood, 'his face dappled by the flickering leaves that caress his face, and sweep out from around his eyebrows' (35).

Translations

character in folklore

• French: homme vert (fr) m
• German: Grüner Mann m
• Italian: please add this translation if you can
• Marathi: हिरवा माणूस m (hirvā māṇūs)

See also

• John Barleycorn
• Jack in the green
• Robin Goodfellow
• woodwose