Cypress Cedar: The Tree with a Stolen Name

Scientific Name: Thuja Plicata (plaited sacrifice) & co.

On the northwestern coast of the Americas, a man loved his people.

Nobody remembers his name. In many cases, he’s remembered as a woman (Grandmother), or, sometimes, a divinity (Selu the corn-mother goddess). However, what people do remember is that he was hopelessly in love with the village that raised him. To them, he gave everything, yet nothing he owned was ever lost, because it was freely given.

But for the man, this was not enough. It wasn’t forever. As he became older, the man sought some way to keep his people safe while he was gone. He came across shelter, medicine, and even magic—yet when people pass, a good future is something not even the bravest parent can guarantee, and a man exempt from greed still isn’t exempt from rust. So, when the man became too old to carry on, he discovered that a person’s will can travel the breadth of lifetimes, but a lifetime can only last a breath.

With this discovery, the man moved on. However, as he did, he left with his people one last gift that would remain. From where he lay, a tree sprouted— frail at first, but taking hold, the plant wove itself into a beautiful giant with soft bark and braided leaves, and it would stand testament to the people it was willed to protect.

Surprisingly, there isn’t a simple answer. In Eastern North America where I grew up, we attributed the title of “cedar” to the Northern white cedar (Thuja occidentalis), which (our history teacher enthusiastically pointed out) settlers used in maritime voyages to prevent scurvy. With its flat green leaves and cocoon-like cones, it was fairly distinct from many other evergreens we would see along our very boreal forest.

Then, someone told me that junipers (Juniperus virginiana) were also sometimes (but not always) called cedars (ie. “Eastern red cedar”). Which was surprising, because these plants were always distinct to me; where the Northern White cedars had bracts, junipers had berries. This title isn’t new, either; apparently, the word “cedar” likely came from the Greek kedros, which roughly translates to cedar, juniper, or citrus, and the word “thuja” (the scientific genus of the Northern White cedar and Western red cedar) likely came from the Greek word thuon, which sometimes meant Cypress-pine or juniper.

Perhaps this confusion makes sense, though, seeing as both junipers and thujas (cypress cedars) are from the same family (the Cypress family, Cupressaceae). However, Cedrus trees, also called cedar, come from the Pine family (Pinaceae), which is usually distinct enough from the Cypress family. Thujas generally grow in North America and Asia, while Cedrus mainly grows in the European continent (junipers growing in both). And, stereotypically, pine wood proliferates but isn’t as durable as the wood of the Cypress family.

That being said, all cedars are known for their durability, falling on the harder side of softwood (lightweight like softwood conifers but durable like hardwood). Despite coming from different families, all cedars produce tannins, a preservative compound that gives their wood its red color. They also produce oils like cypressene and thujopsene, which not only give the plant its characteristic (spicy, smoky citrus) scent but act as natural preservatives and fungicides that save the wood from decay and infestation, long after it’s been cut.

In modern culture, cedar is still used for homes, praised for its resilience and warm colors, though modern cedar tends to degrade quickly, used for guitar soundboards (for its lightweight durability), beehives (for its price and antifungal properties), and mulches (for much the same reason).

Thus, even before Europeans ever set foot in the Americas, people had been using their respective cedars as a reliable source of wood. So reliable, in fact, that it was often used in religious settings. In ancient Middle Eastern societies, people often used Cedrus to build temples; more specifically, “cedar” (likely Cedrus libani, or Lebanon cedars) palaces and temples housed David and Solomon, as well as the Biblical God. Because of its durability, Cedrus was used in crucial cultural junctures; in the ancient Mediterranean, it built up the Phoenician ships, which built up the “first sea trading nation in the world,” and in Egypt, mummification utilized Cedrus resin for the preservation of bodies in a religious process associated with the afterlife.

Cedar (mainly Thuja) was integral to Native American societies as well. It built everything from homes (longhouses) to transportation (canoes) to coffins; fibers were used for clothes, hunting weapons, harvesting baskets, cooking utensils, and medicine. Coincidentally to its scientific name, the Western Red cedar (Thuja plicata) wove baskets (roots), clothing and bedding materials (bark), ropes and weapons (withes), and roof structures (while Thuja roughly translated to “sacrificial,” plicata is thought to mean “plaited,” after its overlapping scales).

Like in Europe, Thuja cedars were integral to religious structures like smokehouses and totem poles. While the fumes of Thuja were used to cleanse the house (of bacteria and bad energy) in what were called smudges, boughs were used around thresholds (windows and doors) of living spaces. In spiritual fasting and sweat lodges, branches and leaves circled the lodge as a form of protection, and shamans around the northwest coast made cedar figures for protection and healing, cedar being a key ritual herb tied to providence and health.

The level of cypressene in cedar depends on the tree’s age. Because of modern demands, cedars today are much more resistant to rot (being harvested much younger). This seems to be a fairly common trend for conifers in general: the faster they’re harvested, the faster they rot; pine, growing much faster than cedar, doesn’t usually last as long; cypress, apparently for the same reason, seems to last longer than pine. However, for this reason, modern cedar differs from ancient cedars as well.

If all cedars are durable, they’re also known for improving people’s health and longevity when they are used correctly. Their antibacterial, antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, and antifungal qualities help epidermal, digestive, or respiratory issues, while the presence of vitamin C and camphene (a cough suppressant) often aids immune issues. Cedars also have astringent (blood-clotting) properties (for both cuts and menstruation), and antispasmodic effects (for both seizures and muscle pain).

Perhaps because of these natural associations with durability, or because they were used in many aforementioned religious contexts, or because cedars are evergreen (a remaining sign of life in the winter), trees of this name often allude to longevity or immortality (as it was in the ancient Mediterranean), as well as incorruptibility. Middle Eastern cedars were blessed by the gods and even their forests were considered divine).

Thuja is likewise associated with concepts of immortality, often being referenced as “arborvitae,” which is Latin for “Tree of Life”. Many Native American communities (like the Ojibwe) suggest cedar created an interconnected network between living things and worlds The Significance of the Tree of Life in Indigenous Culture, just as the idea of the Tree of Life represented the interconnectedness and enduring life of all living things. Further south, the Cherokee community called the cedar “U-we-tsi-a ge-yv,” or the “tree that stands forever.”

These overlaps explain why species from distinct families might be called the same name. It’s like the confusion comes from the similarity between all evergreens as well. After all, (non-cedar) cypress trees also symbolize eternal life, albeit the kind that comes after death, as seen from Zoroastrian rituals of the dead, Biblical resurrections (in Isaiah), and the Greek boy Kyparrisos (who mourns for all eternally after killing his beloved stag). Where Cedrus often represents a modem for the divine to interact with the mortal realm, the North American Thuja integrates the immortal with the mortal. Likewise, pines are often a symbol of eternal life through rebirth.

If this is true, perhaps the North American cedars are closer to what people conceive as “cedar.” Where cedars are often defined by their reddish hue and durability, members of the Cypress family (like Thuja and Juniperus) are also known for these features, while it’s merely a peculiarity of Cedrus within the Pine family. It’s telling, after all, that many of the chemical defenses (like cypressene and thujopsene) are not named after Cedrus.

However, after the Gordian knot of genus confusion had been established, European Christian scientists of the Darwinian era drew a simple divide between the “true” and “false” cedars. True cedars referred to the genus Cedrus (Pinaceae), after the Biblical/Mesopotamian cedars. All other plants (mainly cypress cedars) were dubbed “false cedars” and paired with descriptive epitaphs (ie. “Red cedar” or “white cedar”) which were relative to the people who categorized them. In North America, Juniperus virginiana is called “Eastern red cedar” because it’s found in the East, and Thuja plicata (Giant Arborvitae), found in Western North America, is called “Western red cedar.” On the other hand, the Northern white cedar’s scientific name is Thuja occidentalis, roughly translating into “Western thuja” despite being found in the same areas as the Eastern red cedar, to distinguish it from Eastern arborvitaes like the Korean, Japanese, and Sichuan thujas). However, it’s also called the Eastern Arborvitae, to distinguish it from the Western red cedar (or giant Arborvitae), which is also a thuja.

Because of their relativity (and limited worldview), the scientific descriptors of these plants say a lot, without saying much at all. Not only that, I think it’s misleading. A word or a name is often built through its connotations, and when “cedar” has been built into its respective cultures for so long (for centuries!), through the years and across the continents, its connotations change. And even though most cedars are dubbed “false cedars” in modern categorizations, I think they have fundamentally changed the meaning of the word, “cedar.” The word “false” is misleading for this reason: it suggests these other versions (or species) are not as integral to the cultural inception of the plant.

In the case of the cedar, I think a particular meaning comes from the amalgamation of all its species. Cypress often denotes an afterlife separate from the world of the living, and pine denotes hope and rebirth. Yet representations and cultural uses of cedar don’t seem to defer to anything so intangible. Rather its symbolism is rather humanistic.

In many stories (like in Squamish tellings), cedars are people, created when an individual wishes to give something after their death, or simply want to live on after death.And these figures hold personal grudges. Although Zoroastrian cypresses cast curses on those who cut them (cut a cypress, and it will cut your fortunes), the curses of cedars seem a bit more specific and personal. For example, some people place their babies under large cedars to ensure they get the cedar’s associated blessings of longevity. However, it is said the cedars will curse those who twist their withes (branches) and twist the umbilical cords of their babies.

Likewise, cedars punish those who take from them in excess. In North American folk tales, a deer’s offspring is flecked by the fires of a spitting cedar when she uses it to protect her young, but when the fox makes an even bigger fire for protection, she ends up singeing the whole of her babies. Interesting enough, cedars can truly harm those who take them in excess. While small dose of cedar purportedly clears a person’s airway during ailments, it also contains lactic acid, which is an allergen that exacerbates breathing issues in the logging industry. Thujone is one of the volatile oils that characterize the scent of cedar (in both cypress and Cedrus), and it can be fairly neurotoxic in large quantities, disrupting the body’s mucus production and irritating the respiratory system or gastrointestinal lining, causing ulcers. In more severe cases, it can cause convulsions, hallucinations, and permanent damage to the nervous system.

Thus, it’s important not to drink more than three cups of cedar tea per week, and even less so for people who are pregnant, or epileptic, or afflicted by kidney weakness.

The tree is also unable to protect itself the way it protects others; ie. cedar is useful to others due to its durability, but it’s not known for its hardiness. In particular, cedars are rather sensitive to environmental stress. In fact, despite being an important tree to the top reaches of North America, Western Red Cedar is prone to frost and fire, making its survival through the winter a bit tenuous, especially as a young tree. With relatively shallow roots, the tree thrives on the protection of others, living best in cool, damp locations under the shade of fast-growing trees.

While it’s prone to several rust-causing fungi (including Gymnosporangium, which is a notable disease for fruit trees and junipers), it can also brown in dry, hot summers after a cold, wet winter. Likewise, during the winter, the green leaves of cedars can attract the increasing population of deer, which strip off the leaves as they pass through (especially applicable to Eastern white cedar). On the Western coast of North America, where the weather isn’t as extreme, many larvae (including the juniper pug, which is also pressed to know the difference between cedar and juniper, as well as the autumnal moth) and aphids antagonize the plant.

The same can be said about Cedrus trees— Lebanon cedars suffered from the recent bouts of forest fires and drought.

However, the symbolic bridge between the fragility of the tree and its association with immortality is more clearly drawn in North American cultures. In the European/Middle Eastern representations, Cedrus can often be seen as an intermediary between the mortal and divine, so the death of Cedrus also implicates a separation from our world and the immortal. In the case of Thuja cedars, the tree is integrated into society, as a powerful member of the community, who is also struggling to survive.

I don’t think the cedar promises immortality. Rather, cedars represent the fragility and durability of our willpower in a world that exists past ourselves. Thus, in Hoodoo culture, cedar is used to impart the will of its users chasing away bad residents and bringing in good ones where needed. While much of the physical history of indigenous people had been destroyed in the colonial period, records of their society and their culture are written clearly on the surface of cedar trees that are now protected under the Heritage Conservation Act of 1995, preserving the lives of people who were corporeally silenced and carrying it for them.

Indeed, a thuja occidentalis is thought to be the oldest tree in Ontario, and the Western Red Cedars in British Columbia (the west coast of Canada) have a history of a thousand years.

Ultimately, I think cedars are most well-defined in Native American culture, where they say that carving a figure into cedar can bring it to life (Cherokee) or that a cedar stores your history (while way up north in Eskimo regions). Cedar is an example of a plant that has broken through technical taxonomy to show the imperfections of human categorization and to bring light to the idea that our perceptions of plants are often skewed by our emotional (not scientific/logical) relationship.