ifig

Old English ifig has no certain etymology beyond Proto-Germanic *ibahaz. The plant's name may be related to a root meaning 'to climb,' which would make it one of those rare words that describe exactly what the thing does. Ivy climbs. That is its defining behavior: using aerial rootlets to attach to walls, trees, and any vertical surface. The common ivy (Hedera helix) is native to Europe, western Asia, and northern Africa. The helix in its Latin name means 'spiral' — the plant spirals as it climbs.

In ancient Greece, ivy was sacred to Dionysus, the god of wine. Dionysus was often depicted wearing an ivy crown, and his followers (maenads and satyrs) wore ivy wreaths during rituals. The association was practical as well as symbolic: ancient Greeks believed ivy could prevent drunkenness, and ivy leaves were sometimes added to wine. Roman poets continued the association. Horace, Virgil, and Ovid all mention ivy in connection with poetry and divine inspiration. A poet crowned with ivy was touched by the gods.

The Ivy League — Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, Brown, Penn, Dartmouth, and Cornell — got its name from a 1937 article by Caswell Adams in the New York Herald Tribune. Adams used 'Ivy' dismissively, referring to the old brick buildings covered in ivy and the athletic conferences that had been playing each other since the 1800s. The schools disliked the label initially. By the 1950s, they had adopted it. The name stuck because the image was too perfect: old, climbing, clinging to stone walls, impossible to remove.

Ivy is actually destructive to buildings. Its aerial rootlets penetrate mortar, accelerate weathering, and can damage brickwork over decades. English Heritage and other preservation organizations have long debated whether to remove ivy from historic structures. The plant that symbolizes the permanence of old institutions is slowly eating them.