St Hildegard of Bingen was a German Benedictine abbess in the 12th century who had extraordinary visions. She wrote about these visions in theological books, and used them as inspiration for compositions. She founded her own abbey, created her own language, and wrote one of the first musical plays. She adored many things—the Blessed Mother, beer, midday naps—but in her encyclopedic treatise on the medicinal properties of the natural world, Physica, she expresses a special love for spelt, proclai