Herb
Blue berries on a spiteful little bush — smoke people have trusted for millennia.
These are associations the community holds, not settled fact — the more a reading is shared, the bolder it sits.
Juniper has the widest natural range of any conifer on earth, from the Arctic to the Mediterranean mountains, which means an unusual number of unrelated cultures arrived at the same conclusion about it independently: burn it. Juniper smoke was used as a fumigant in Egyptian, Greek, Tibetan, Scottish and Scandinavian practice, and the Scottish Highland custom of saining a house with juniper smoke at New Year is documented into the nineteenth century.
The berries — which are not berries but fleshy cones — are what gives gin its name and its character, by way of the Dutch genever. Highland practice specified juniper gathered in particular ways and burnt until the household could barely breathe, then all the doors thrown open. It is a thorough sort of cleansing and not a subtle one.
Craft uses it for protection and purification, often as a European alternative to plants that belong to other people. The bush itself is prickly, slow, and increasingly scarce in Britain, so berries are better bought than gathered.
Readings practitioners have offered, ordered by how many recognise them. Take what serves, leave the rest.
Carried forward
Scottish Highland practice, recorded nineteenth century
Saining: juniper burnt through a house at the turn of the year until the smoke was almost unbearable, then every door and window opened at once. Collectors recorded the custom from people who still kept it, sometimes reluctantly.
Carried forward
Nicholas Culpeper, The Complete Herbal (1653)
Culpeper calls it an admirable solar shrub scarce to be paralleled for its virtues, then attributes to it a catalogue of cures that would make it the most useful plant ever grown. His enthusiasm is infectious and should not be mistaken for evidence.
Credit what you carry. Much of this comes from living traditions, and some of it from traditions that are closed — held by particular peoples and not offered for general use. Where you know whose practice a reading came from, name them; where you don't, say that too.