Tilia

Type: Wholly Owned Subsidiary of Jarden Corp.
Address: 303 Second Street, North Tower, Floor 5, San Francisco, California 94107, U.S.A.
Telephone: (415) 371-7200
Toll Free: 800-777-5452
Fax: (415) 896-6469
Employees: 150
Sales: $184 million (2001)
Incorporated: 1990
NAIC: 333319 Other Commercial and Service Industry Machinery Manufacturing

Tilia Inc. is a manufacturer and distributor of vacuum packaging systems used to store food. Tilia's kitchen appliances are sold under the names FoodSaver and FreshSaver. The company also sells a variety of accessory products intended for use with its vacuum packaging systems, including bags, canisters, and jar sealers. Tilia's products are sold in warehouse retail outlets, discount stores, grocery stores, through a company-operated Web site, and through infomercial programs aired on television. Acquired by Jarden Corp. in 2002, Tilia also markets its products overseas through partnership agreements.

Tilia began with an innovation, a vacuum packaging system developed by a German inventor named Hanns Kristen. Kristen's experimentations were driven by his belief that the vacuum systems in existence fell short of being true to their name. He surveyed the products on the market in the mid-1980s and discovered that most of the vacuum systems available sealed bags without first removing all the air from the bags. In 1987, Kristen succeeded in developing what would become known as the "FoodSaver," a product with impressive capabilities whose success was stalled by the absence of effective marketing support.

The advantages afforded to the consumer by the FoodSaver family of products were enticing, but relatively few consumers were aware of the novel product until years after Kristen's pioneering work. It took roughly a decade before FoodSaver was able to shed its anonymity and draw the attention of U.S. consumers. The person responsible for igniting the interest in Kirsten's invention joined Tilia about three years after the introduction of the FoodSaver on the market. In 1993, Linda Graebner was named president and chief executive officer of Tilia, the parent company of Nationwide Marketing, which was directly involved with marketing the unique vacuum packaging system developed by Kristen.

Graebner was responsible for broadcasting the merits of the FoodSaver to consumers in the United States. She joined Tilia after vacating her post as vice-president of marketing for the Dole Food Company. At the time of her arrival, Nationwide Marketing sold three different models of the FoodSaver: the FoodSaver II, the FoodSaver Professional, and the Food Saver Compact. Although there were features that distinguished each model, all three included two-way cutting blades, jar-sealing attachments, and instructional videos. Additionally, the company marketed the VacuSave Commercial Vacuum Packaging System, which was designed for food sealing and storage for institutional users. Aside from equipment, Tilia, through Nationwide Marketing, offered a variety of accessories that included the company's patented VacLoc bags, canisters, and jar sealers.

The company and the products Graebner took charge of in 1993 possessed qualities that were sufficient, in retrospect, to attract customers. The FoodSaver family of counter-top products employed powerful piston pumps to remove air from Tilia's VacLoc bags, enabling food to remain fresh three to five times longer than if the food were refrigerated in a conventional manner. The reusable bags, which were boilable, microwaveable, and washable, featured a nylon layer that provided a complete oxygen, moisture, and odor barrier. As opposed to canning, vacuum packing did not sterilize food, thereby making it shelf-stable, but by removing air, vacuum packaging dramatically slowed the deterioration of food caused by air. For the consumer, vacuum packaging promised a savings of time and money, enabling users to buy in bulk quantities and retain freshness far longer than traditional food storage methods offered.

Graebner realized the strengths of Tilia's vacuum packaging system when she took the helm in 1993. Shortly after her appointment, she agreed to an interview with HFD--The Weekly Home Furnishings Newspaper that revealed her thoughts about her new company. In the June 14, 1993 interview, she said: "With my background, clearly my arrival is a commitment to build the business and to increase our marketing efforts. I have quite a bit of advertising experience through doing a lot of television commercials at Dole. My view of this opportunity is that FoodSaver is clearly the premier product in this category, and we want to create more awareness about its superiority. Our machine is patented and the only true vacuum saving product and we want to create some more awareness about it."

Graebner realized the importance of delineating the strengths of the Food Saver family of products from the beginning of her tenure at Tilia. It would take several years, however, before she could broadcast the marketable qualities of a genuine vacuum packaging system to the public to an extent that could foster significant sales growth. A private company backed by venture capital, Tilia lacked the financial resources to deliver an effective, broadly based message to the public. In time, once the financial resources were available, Graebner's vision was manifested in an effective marketing campaign that vaulted FoodSaver onto the national stage, thereby delivering exponential sales growth to Tilia.

Tilia generated less than $10 million in annual sales when Graebner assumed responsibility for spearheading FoodSaver's marketing campaign. The company's revenue volume did not increase substantially in the years immediately following Graebner's arrival, but the momentum toward greater growth began to build not long after she joined the company. Historically, Tilia had garnered the bulk of its sales from distributing FoodSaver models to club stores, the membership discount stores frequented by consumers who preferred to buy in bulk quantities. To a lesser extent, the company advertised FoodSaver on cable television shopping channels. The breadth of distribution began to widen in 1995, however, when a new vice-president of sales, Jim Schnabel, joined Tilia. The team of Graebner and Schnabel began to plan for FoodSaver's introduction into department stores. For the most expensive models of the company's vacuum packaging system, retail prices were reduced from $300 to $230. The financial goal, as articulated by Schnabel in 1995, was to increase sales 15 percent for the year and between 15 percent and 20 percent for 1996.

Despite the efforts to broaden distribution, annual sales did not increase with the percentage gains that later confirmed FoodSaver's maturation into a product of national recognition. The foray into department stores failed to capture the interest of consumers. FoodSaver was a product whose novelty proved to be its own undoing. "It is a product that doesn't sell itself," Graebner explained in an October 11, 1999 interview with HFN--The Weekly Newspaper for the Home Furnishing Network. "It needs description and education," she added. Patrons of department stores looked at the FoodSaver and, presumably, were confronted by a product whose value they little understood. A different way of effectively delivering the value of FoodSaver needed to be found to unlock the potential of vacuum packaging to the public. Toward the end of her fifth year in charge of Tilia, Graebner found the ideal way to relate FoodSaver's worth.

During the late 1990s, no better format existed to describe and to demonstrate the capabilities of a product to a mass audience than an infomercial. Tilia aired its first infomercial in December 1998, a program that featured the FoodSaver Compact II, one of three models offered by the company. At the time of the infomercial's debut, Tilia was ending a year during which it collected $18.5 million in sales. From this point forward, the company began to record robust financial growth, as it at last found a way to preach to potential customers. During the first six months of 1999, Tilia sold more FoodSaver vacuum packaging systems than it did during the previous year. The broadcast of the infomercial was part of an aggressive marketing campaign unleashed in 1999, an advertising program that also included marketing FoodSaver through print catalogs and through traditional retail advertising methods. Infomercials were the deciding factor in the ascendance of FoodSaver, however, injecting Tilia's signature product line with unprecedented vitality. The effectiveness of the company's infomercials also had a beneficial effect on the retail success of the FoodSaver line. "It [the infomercial] is clearly driving retail business," Graebner explained in her October 11, 1999 interview with HFN-The Weekly Newspaper for the Home Furnishing Network. "Because when you promote it on television," she added, "the subsequent retail business is strong. Consumers are seeing the infomercial and walking into their retailer and purchasing the product."

Fueled by the aggressive marketing campaign, Tilia's revenue volume swelled dramatically as the company ended its first decade of existence. Sales increased from less than $20 million in 1998 to more than $80 million in 1999. By 2000, when infomercials accounted for one-quarter of the company's sales, the effect of the marketing campaign on Tilia's retail business was evident, its growth sparked by the increased awareness of FoodSaver. Between 1998 and 2000, the company's retail distribution quadrupled, confirming Graebner's belief that the infomercials would not only add another source of revenue but also spur growth in Tilia's retail sales. "We had the products, but the biggest challenges for us was educating consumers," Graebner explained in an October 27, 2000 interview with San Francisco Business Times. "The cable shows created a wide audience and brought us new accounts such as Wal-Mart and Kmart."

While in the midst of watching the company expand at a rapid pace, Graebner began to pay increasing attention to Tilia's presence overseas. At the end of 2001, when the company recorded $184 million in sales, Tilia signed an agreement with Sanyo to help bring FoodSaver to the Japanese market. The agreement, which gave responsibility to Sanyo for the distribution and marketing of the vacuum packaging appliance in Japan, was not the first international partnership Tilia forged but it was the most important overseas deal the company made. In an interview with HFN-The Weekly Newspaper for the Home Furnishing Network, Graebner marked the occasion by articulating her commitment to the further development of Tilia's international business. "A big part of our message," she said, "is we're continuing to look for strong partners to broaden our base, and we really want them to be partners, not just distributors. Right now we're really focusing on international growth and looking for potential candidates."

Graebner's efforts to orchestrate Tilia's international expansion soon were overshadowed by events on the company's domestic front. During the spring of 2002, merger negotiations were underway that would lead Graebner to forsake Tilia's independence for the benefits of joining another company. The discussions sprang from a relationship with Alltrista Corp., the dominant player in the home-canning business. Tilia had used Alltrista's Ball brand of jars to demonstrate the advantages of using FoodSaver's vacuum packing system in home canning, which led the two companies to entertain the idea of merging their operations. The central figure leading the negotiations was Alltrista's chief executive officer, Martin Franklin, who assumed control over the company in September 2001 and immediately began to make sweeping changes at the company. Franklin moved the company's headquarters to Rye, New York, trimmed its involvement in the industrial market, and focused Alltrista's effort on the consumer market. In a March 29, 2002 interview with the San Francisco Chronicle, Franklin explained his reasoning behind the interest in Tilia. "We looked at the home preservation industry," he said, "and really the market leader that's carved out an entire sector on their own is Tilia."

There were benefits for each company in the corporate union. Franklin expected the acquisition of Tilia to immediately increase Alltrista's earnings and double the size of its consumer business. For Tilia, there were several advantages to be gained by being absorbed by Alltrista, which possessed a much bigger distribution network than Tilia's. Alltrista's distribution network included a strong presence in grocery store chains, an area of the retail sector where Tilia enjoyed little exposure. Furthermore, the deal promised to give Tilia greater access to capital. Alltrista agreed to pay $145 million for Tilia and assume responsibility for $15 million of Tilia's debt, as well as to award Tilia as much as $25 million in cash or stock during the ensuing three years provided certain profit requirements were met. The merger, which combined Tilia's $184 million in sales with Alltrista's $241 million in sales, was completed in April 2002. "This is the marriage of a sales- and marketing-strong company [Tilia] with a manufacturing- and distribution-strong company [Alltrista]," Franklin remarked in an April 8, 2002 interview with HFN-The Weekly Newspaper for the Home Furnishing Network.

Several weeks after the merger was completed, Alltrista changed its name to Jarden Corp., a change in identity meant to signal the company's emphasis on the consumer market. Under the control of Jarden, Tilia retained much of its independence, operating as separately managed subsidiary within a decentralized organizational structure. Graebner kept her titles as the company's leader, presiding over a new era of Tilia's existence.

As Tilia moved forward, the company was expected to benefit from the support of Jarden. One significant change to Tilia's operations that occurred under Jarden's control was the company's partnership with a leader in the food preparation market. In late 2003, Jarden acquired VillaWare Manufacturing, a maker of small electric kitchen appliances, cookware, and kitchen tools such as waffle makers and panini grills. Jarden combined VillaWare's and Tilia's marketing and operations functions, although the two companies' sales forces remained independent of each other. In the years ahead, as Tilia attempted to capitalize on the spreading awareness of its product, the exploitation of Jarden's distribution network promised to deliver robust growth. At the time of its acquisition by Jarden, Tilia had reached only 3.5 percent of the nation's households, a percentage figure that Graebner hoped to significantly increase in the future.

Principal Subsidiaries

Tilia Direct, Inc.

Principal Competitors

American Household, Inc.; Conair Corporation; Newell Rubbermaid Inc.

Further Reading

"Alltrista to Acquire Tilia International, Inc.," Gourmet Retailer, May 2002, p. 20.

Cariaga, Vance, "Jarden Corp.," Investor's Business Daily, September 6, 2002, p. A7.

"Foodstuff," Houston Chronicle, August 29, 2001, p. 2.

Ginsberg, Steve, "Food Rapper Tilia Zips up Revenue with Road Show," San Francisco Business Times, October 27, 2000, p. 19.

Hill, Dawn, "Schnabel Steers Tilia's FoodSaver," HFN-The Weekly Newspaper for the Home Furnishing Network, October 2, 1995, p. 68.

"More Tilia Vac Packaging Lines," HFN-The Weekly Newspaper for the Home Furnishing Network, January 12, 1998, p. 118.

Porter, Thyra, "Tilia Vacuums up Market; Informercial Educates Consumers about Packaging Food," HFN-The Weekly Newspaper for the Home Furnishing Network, October 11, 1999, p. 82.

Quail, Jennifer, "Sanyo to Distribute Tilia's Line of FoodSaver Appliances in Japan," HFN-The Weekly Newspaper for the Home Furnishing Network, December 17, 2001, p. 46.

------, "Sealing the Deal; Alltrista's Acquisition of Tilia Is Expected to Create a New Force in Food Preservation," HFN-The Weekly Newspaper for the Home Furnishing Network, April 8, 2002, p. 50.

------, "Jarden Acquires Villaware, Combines It with Tilia Inc.," HFN-The Weekly Newspaper for the Home Furnishing Network, October 27, 2003, p. 3.

Renstrom, Roger, "Alltrista Pays $160 Million to Acquire Tilia," Plastics News, May 6, 2002, p. 9.

Sarkar, Pia, "Alltrista to Acquire San Francisco's Tilia," San Francisco Chronicle, March 29, 2002, p. B2.

Thomas, Laura, "Taking the Bad Air Out," San Francisco Chronicle, October 6, 2001, p. WB2.

"Tilia and VillaWare Join Forces," Gourmet Retailer, December 2003, p. 8.

"Tilia Taps Graebner for President, CEO," HFD-The Weekly Home Furnishings Newspaper, June 14, 1993, p. 59.

— Jeffrey L. Covell

The botanical name for linden.

The noun has one meaning:

Meaning #1: deciduous trees with smooth usually silver-gray bark of North America and Europe and Asia: lime trees; lindens; basswood
  Synonym: genus Tilia

Tilia
Tilia tomentosa Morton Arboretum acc. 1040-65*2
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Plantae
(unranked):	Angiosperms
(unranked):	Eudicots
(unranked):	Rosids
Order:	Malvales
Family:	Malvaceae
Genus:	Tilia L.
Species
About 30; see text

Tilia leaf

Tilia is a genus of about 30 species of trees, native throughout most of the temperate Northern Hemisphere, in Asia (where the greatest species diversity is found), Europe and eastern North America; it is not native to western North America. Under the Cronquist classification system, this genus was placed in the family Tiliaceae, but genetic research by the APG has resulted in the incorporation of this family into the Malvaceae. The trees are generally called lime in Britain and linden in parts of Europe and North America (where they are also known as basswood).

Tilia species are large deciduous trees, reaching typically 20–40 m tall, with oblique-cordate leaves 6–20 cm across, and are found through the north temperate regions. The exact number of species is subject to considerable uncertainty, as many or most of the species will hybridise readily, both in the wild and in cultivation.

Contents 1 Name 2 Species 2.1 Hybrids and cultivars 3 Description 4 Uses 4.1 Medicinal uses 5 History 6 Cultural significance 6.1 Slavic mythology 6.2 Germanic mythology 6.3 Greek mythology 6.4 Romantic symbol 6.4.1 Other literary references 7 See also 8 References

Name

The lower epidermis of Tilia X cordata showing veination.

Lime is an altered form of Middle English lind, in the 16th century also line, from Old English feminine lind or linde, Proto-Germanic *lendā, cognate to Latin lentus "flexible" and Sanskrit latā "liana". Within Germanic, English lithe, German lind "lenient, yielding" are from the same root.

Linden was originally the adjective, "made from lime-wood", from the late 16th century also used as a noun, probably influenced by translations of German romance, as an adoption of Linden, the plural of German Linde (OED). Neither the name nor the tree is related to the citrus fruit called "lime" (Citrus aurantifolia, family Rutaceae). Another widely-used common name used in North America is Basswood, derived from bast, the name for the inner bark (see Uses, below).

Latin tilia is cognate to Greek πτελέᾱ "elm tree", τιλίαι "black poplar" (Hes.), ultimately from a PIE *ptel-ei̯ā with a meaning of "broad (feminine)", perhaps "broad-leaved" or similar (IEW).

Species

The following list comprises those most widely accepted as species.

• Tilia americana Basswood or American Linden
• Tilia amurensis Amur Lime or Amur Linden
• Tilia begoniifolia (syn. T. dasystyla subsp. caucasica)
• Tilia caroliniana Carolina Basswood
• Tilia chinensis
• Tilia chingiana
• Tilia cordata Small-leaved Lime, Little-leaf Linden or Greenspire Linden
• Tilia dasystyla
• Tilia euchlora Caucasian Lime
• Tilia henryana Henry's Lime or Henry's Linden
• Tilia heterophylla White Basswood
• Tilia hupehensis Hubei Lime
• Tilia insularis
• Tilia intonsa
• Tilia japonica Japanese Lime, Shina (When used as a laminate)
• Tilia kiusiana
• Tilia mandshurica Manchurian Lime
• Tilia maximowicziana
• Tilia mexicana (T. americana var. mexicana)
• Tilia miqueliana
• Tilia mongolica Mongolian Lime or Mongolian Linden
• Tilia nobilis
• Tilia occidentalis West lime
• Tilia oliveri Oliver's Lime
• Tilia paucicostata
• Tilia platyphyllos Large-leaved Lime
• Tilia rubra Red Stem Lime (syn. T. platyphyllos var. rubra)
• Tilia tomentosa Silver Lime or Silver Linden
• Tilia tuan

Hybrids and cultivars

Leaves and trunk of common lime (Tilia × europaea)

• Tilia × euchlora (T. dasystyla × T. cordata)
• Tilia × europaea Common Lime (T. cordata × T. platyphyllos; syn. T. × vulgaris)
• Tilia × petiolaris (T. tomentosa × T. ?)
• Tilia 'Flavescens' Glenleven Linden (T. americana × T. cordata)
• Tilia 'Moltkei' (hybrid, unknown origin)
• Tilia 'Orbicularis' (hybrid, unknown origin)
• Tilia 'Spectabilis' (hybrid, unknown origin)

Description

The Linden's sturdy trunk stands like a pillar and the branches divide and subdivide into numerous ramifications on which the spray is small and thick. In summer this is profusely clothed with large leaves and the result is a dense head of abundant foliage.^[1]

The leaves of all the lindens are one-sided, always heart-shaped, and the tiny fruit, looking like peas, always hangs attached to a curious, ribbon-like, greenish yellow bract, whose use seems to be to launch the ripened seed-clusters just a little beyond the parent tree. The flowers of the European and American lindens are similar, except that the American bears a petal-like scale among its stamens and the European varieties are destitute of these appendages. All of the lindens may be propagated by cuttings and grafting as well as by seed. They grow rapidly in a rich soil, but are subject to the attacks of many insect enemies.^[1]

Uses

Linden foliage in autumn colors from Ekoparken in Stockholm.

The venation within the bract of a Lime tree.

The Linden is to be recommended as an ornamental tree when a mass of foliage or a deep shade is desired.^[1] The tree produces fragrant and nectar-producing flowers, the medicinal herb lime blossom. They are very important honey plants for beekeepers, producing a very pale but richly flavoured monofloral honey. The flowers are also used for herbal tea, and this infusion is particularly popular in Europe.

T. cordata is the preferred species for medical use, having a high concentration of active compounds. It is said to be a nervine, used by herbalists in treating restlessness, hysteria, and headaches. Usually, the double-flowered lindens are used to make perfumes. The leaf buds and young leaves are also edible raw. Tilia species are used as food plants by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species; see List of Lepidoptera that feed on Tilia.

Limewood Saint George by Tilman Riemenschneider, c. 1490.

The timber of lime trees is soft, easily worked, and has very little grain, and a density of 560kg per cubic meter^[2]. It is a popular wood for model building and intricate carving. Especially in Germany, it was the classic wood for sculpture from the Middle Ages onwards, and is the material for the elaborate altarpieces of Veit Stoss, Tilman Riemenschneider and many others. Ease of working and good acoustic properties also make it popular for electric guitar and bass bodies and wind instruments such as recorders. In the past, it was typically used (along with Agathis) for less-expensive models. However, due to its better resonance at mid and high frequency, and better sustain than alder, it is now more commonly in use with the "superstrat" type of guitar. It can also be used for the neck because of its excellent material integrity when bent and ability to produce consistent tone without any dead spots according to Parker Guitars. In the percussion industry, basswood is sometimes used as a material for drum shells, both to enhance their sound and their aesthetics. It is also the wood of choice for the window-blinds and shutters industries. Real wood blinds are often made from this lightweight but strong and stable wood which is well suited to natural and stained finishes.

It is known in the trade as basswood, particularly in North America. This name originates from the inner fibrous bark of the tree, known as bast (Old English language). A very strong fibre was obtained from this, by peeling off the bark and soaking in water for a month; after which the inner fibres can be easily separated. Bast obtained from the inside of the bark of the lime tree has been used by the Ainu people of Japan to weave their traditional clothing, the attus.

Medicinal uses

Most medicinal research has focused on Tilia cordata although other species are also used medicinally and somewhat interchangeably. The dried flowers are mildly sweet and sticky, and the fruit is somewhat sweet and mucilaginous. Limeflower tea has a pleasing taste, due to the aromatic volatile oil found in the flowers. The flowers, leaves, wood, and charcoal (obtained from the wood) are used for medicinal purposes. Active ingredients in the lime flowers include flavonoids (which act as antioxidants), volatile oils, and mucilaginous constituents (which soothe and reduce inflammation). The plant also contains tannins that can act as an astringent.^[3]

Lime flowers are used in colds, cough, fever, infections, inflammation, high blood pressure, headache (particularly migraine), as a diuretic (increases urine production), antispasmodic (reduces smooth muscle spasm along the digestive tract), and sedative. ^[4] New evidence shows that the flowers may be hepatoprotective.^[5] The flowers were added to baths to quell hysteria, and steeped as a tea to relieve anxiety-related indigestion, irregular heartbeat, and vomiting. The leaves are used to promote sweating to reduce fevers. The wood is used for liver and gallbladder disorders and cellulitis (inflammation of the skin and surrounding soft tissue). That wood burned to charcoal is ingested to treat intestinal disorders and used topically to treat edema or infection such as cellulitis or ulcers of the lower leg.^[3]

Bole of an ancient linden at Frankenbrunn, near Bad Kissingen, Bavaria

History

Lime Nail galls, caused by the mite, Eriophyes tiliae tiliae.

In Europe, Lime trees are known to have reached ages measured in centuries, if not longer. A coppice of T. cordata in Westonbirt Arboretum in Gloucestershire, for example, is estimated to be 2,000 years old.[1]In the courtyard of the Imperial Castle at Nuremberg is a lime which tradition says was planted by the Empress Cunigunde, the wife of Henry II of Germany. This would make the tree about nine hundred years old (as of 1900^[update] when it was described). It looks ancient and infirm, but in 1900 was sending forth thrifty leaves on its two or three remaining branches and was of course cared for tenderly. The famous Lime of Neustadt on the Kocher in Württemberg was computed to be one thousand years old when it fell.^[1]. The Alte Linde tree of Naters, Switzerland, is mentioned in a document in 1357 and described by the writer at that time as already "magnam" (huge). A plaque at its foot mentions that in 1155 a Lime tree was already on this spot.

• The excellence of the honey of far-famed Hybla was due to the lime trees that covered its sides and crowned its summit.
• The name of Linnaeus, the great botanist, was derived from a lime tree.
• Tilia appears in the tertiary formations of Grinnel Land in 82° north latitude, and in Spitsbergen. Sapporta believed that he found there the common ancestor of the limes of Europe and America.^[1]

Cultural significance

Further information: Trees in mythology

Slavic mythology

In old Slavic mythology, linden (lipa, as called in Slavic languages) was considered a sacred tree.^[6] To this day, the lime tree is a national emblem of Slovakia, Slovenia, the Czech Republic and the Sorbs.^{[citation needed]} Lipa gave name to the traditional Slavic name for the month of June (Croatian, lipanj) or July (Polish, lipiec). It is also the root for the German city of Leipzig, taken from the Sorbian name lipsk.^[7] The Croatian currency, kuna, consists of 100 lipa, also meaning "linden"; "lipa" was also a proposed name for Slovenian currency in 1990, however the name "tolar" ultimately prevailed.^[8]. In the Slavic Orthodox Christian world, limewood was the preferred wood for panel icon painting. The famous icons by the hand of Andrei Rublev, including the Holy Trinity (Hospitality of Abraham), and The Savior, now in the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow, are painted on limewood. Limewood was chosen for its ability to be sanded very smooth, and for its resistance to warping once seasoned.

The tree also has cultural and spiritual significance in Hungary, where it is called hars(fa).

Germanic mythology

The tilia was also a highly symbolic and hallowed tree to the Germanic peoples in their native pre-Christian Germanic mythology.

Originally, local communities assembled not only to celebrate and dance under the lime-tree, but to hold their judicial thing meetings there in order to restore justice and peace. It was believed that the tree would help unearth the truth. Thus the tree became associated with jurisprudence even after Christianization, such as in the case of the Gerichtslinde, and verdicts in rural Germany were frequently returned sub tilia (under the lime-tree) until the Age of Enlightenment.

In the Nibelungenlied, a medieval German work ultimately based on oral tradition recounting events amongst the Germanic tribes in the 5th and 6th centuries, Siegfried gains his invulnerability by bathing in the blood of a dragon. While he did so, a single linden tree leaf sticks to him, leaving a spot on his body untouched by the blood and he thus has a single point of vulnerability.

The most famous street in Berlin, Germany is called Unter den Linden or Under the lindens, named after the linden trees lining the boulevard. In German folklore, the linden tree is the "tree of lovers."

Greek mythology

Homer, Horace, Virgil, and Pliny mention the lime-tree and mention its virtues. As Ovid tells the old story of Baucis and Philemon, she was changed into a linden and he into an oak when the time came for them both to die.

Herodotus says:

The Scythian diviners take also the leaf of the lime-tree, which, dividing into three parts, they twine round their fingers; they then unbind it and exercise the art to which they pretend.

^[1]

Romantic symbol

A mediaeval love poem by Walther von der Vogelweide (c. 1170–c. 1230) starts with a reference to the lime-tree:

Under der linden an der heide, dâ unser zweier bette was, dâ mugt ir vinden schône beide gebrochen bluomen unde gras. vor dem wald in einem tal, tandaradei, schône sanc diu nahtegal.

Under the lime tree on the open field, where we two had our bed, you still can see lovely both broken flowers and grass. On the edge of the woods in a vale, tandaradei, sweetly sang the nightingale.

Linden-trees play a significant motif in a number of poems written by the most famous Romanian romantic poet Mihai Eminescu. An excerpt from his poem Mai am un singur dor (One Wish Alone Have I):

Pătrunză talanga Al serii rece vânt, Deasupră-mi teiul sfânt Să-şi scuture creanga.

While softly rings The evening's cool wind Above me the holy lime Shakes its branch. (translation: M.G.Jiva)

In 1979, the trees were featured in the song Gelato al Cioccolato on the album of the same name by Italian singer-songwriter Enzo Ghinazzi, also known as Pupo.

In 2003, the trees were featured in popular song Dragostea Din Tei (Love from Linden Trees) by Moldovan band O-Zone.

Other literary references

• Samuel Taylor Coleridge features lime trees as an important symbol in his poem "This Lime-Tree Bower My Prison" (written 1797; first published 1800).
• The short poems (Fraszki) of Polish poet Jan Kochanowski commonly feature lime trees, especially "Na Lipę" (To The Lime Tree), published in 1584. Kochanowski was heavily influenced by the Czarnolas, or the Polish Black Forest, where the dominant tree species is lime.
• The linden tree is featured as a symbol of supernatural dread in Hannah Crafts' The Bondwoman's Narrative.
• A road lined with linden trees is cursed by the narrator of the famous censored poem, "Ich was ein chint so wolgetan" (I was such a lovely child), from the Carmina Burana.
• A poem from Wilhelm Müller's Winterreise cycle of poems is called "Der Lindenbaum" (The Linden Tree). The cycle was later set to music by Franz Schubert.
• The linden tree features throughout Goethe's The Sorrows of Young Werther; Werther is finally buried under one.
• Linden trees are featured in Tolstoy's War and Peace.
• In Swann's Way, the first book of Proust's In Search of Lost Time, the narrator dips a petite madeleine into a cup of linden or lime blossom tea. The aroma and taste of cake and tea triggers his first conscious involuntary memory.
• The band Bright Eyes has a song called 'Lime Tree' on the album Cassadaga. "Under the eaves of that old Lime Tree I stood examining the fruit."

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Tilia

Wikispecies has information related to: Tilia

Look up tilia in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• Dragostea Din Tei — a Romanian/Moldovan song referring to lindens
• Unter den Linden — an avenue of lindens in Berlin, Germany

References

1. ^ ^{a b c d e f} Keeler, Harriet L. (1900). Our Native Trees and How to Identify Them. New York: Charles Scriber's Sons. pp. 24–31. 
2. ^ Lime timber. Niche Timbers. Accessed 19-08-2009.
3. ^ ^{a b} Bradley P., ed. (1992). British Herbal Compendium. Vol. 1: 142–144. British Herbal Medicine Association, Dorset (Great Britain)
4. ^ Coleta, M., Campos, M. G., Cotrim, M. D., et al. (2001). Comparative evaluation of Melissa officinalis L., Tilia europaea L., Passiflora edulis Sims. and Hypericum perforatum L. in the elevated plus maze anxiety test. Pharmacopsychiatry 34 (suppl 1): S20–1
5. ^ Matsuda. H., Ninomiya, K., Shimoda, H., & Yoshikawa, M. (2002). Hepatoprotective principles from the flowers of Tilia argentea (linden): structure requirements of tiliroside and mechanisms of action. Bioorg Med Chem. 10 (30): 707–712.
6. ^ Archaeology and Language: Language change and cultural transformation Roger Blench, Matthew Spriggs, p.199
7. ^ Hanswilhelm Haefs. Das 2. Handbuch des nutzlosen Wissens. ISBN 3831137544 (German)
8. ^ See Slovenska lipa

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