Herbalism

“ MANDRAKE FROM A SAXON HERBAL
(Sloane 1975, folio 49a)
In the treatment of disease we find that the material remedies, by which I mean remedies devoid of any mystic meaning, are with few exceptions entirely herbal. The herb drinks were made up with ale, milk or vinegar, many of the potions were made of herbs mixed with honey, and ointments were made of herbs worked up with butter. The most scientific prescription is that for a vapour bath, [22] and there are suggestions for what may become fashionable once more—herb baths. ”

“ For winter use the tops of the most useful kinds of herbs should be cut when in flower or full leaf and quite dry, and spread out in an airy but shady place so as to part slowly with the moisture they contain and at the same time retain their aromatic properties. When quite dry they should be put into dry wide-mouthed bottles and kept closely corked. In this way such herbs as basil, marjoram, mint, sage, savory, thyme, balm, chamomile, horehound, hyssop and rue, as well as parsley, may be had throughout the season with almost the full flavour of the fresh herb. ”

“ Scattered through the Herbal we find recipes for the cure of many other ailments with which modern science does not attempt to cope. For instance, under “peony” we read: “The black graines (that is the seed) to the number of fifteene taken in wine or mead is a speciall remedie for those that are troubled in the night with the disease called the Night Mare, which is as though a heavy burthen were laid upon them and they oppressed therewith, as if they were overcome with their enemies, or overprest with some great weight or burthen, and they are also good against melancholie dreames.” ”

“ Although these herbalists are aware that certain plants or roots will produce a specified effect upon the human system, they attribute the benefit to the fact that such remedies are distasteful and injurious to the demons who are present in the system and to whom the disease is attributed. Many of these herbalists are found among women, also; and these, too, are generally members of the Midē ́wiwin. In Fig. 1 is shown an herbalist preparing a mixture.
Fig. 1.—Herbalist preparing medicine and treating patient. ”

“ The olitory or herb-garden is a part of our horticulture now comparatively neglected, and yet once the culture and culling of simples was as much a part of female education as the preserving and tying down of ‘rasps and apricocks.’ There was not a Lady Bountiful in the kingdom but made her dill-tea and diet-drink from herbs of her own planting; and there is a [6] neatness and prettiness about our thyme, and sage, and mint and marjoram, that might yet, we think, transfer them from the patronage of the blue serge to that of the white muslin apron. ”

“ Scientific reasons which are self-convincing may be readily adduced for prescribing all our best known native herbal medicines. Among them the Elder, Parsley, Peppermint, and Watercress may be taken as familiar examples of this leading fact. Almost from time immemorial in England a "rob" made from the juice of Elderberries simmered and thickened with sugar, or mulled Elder wine concocted from the fruit, with raisins, sugar, and spices, has been a popular remedy in this country, if taken hot at bedtime, for a recent cold, or for a sore throat. ”

“ The same benefit which the medicinal principle developed by itself works in its own constitution it confers upon man when subjected to the same evil. And so it is with all the herbal medicines. They have a purpose to serve in the economy of the plant that yields them before they can minister to human sickness and disease. Sugar was not meant in the first instance to sweeten man's cup, but to store up food for the plant in order to enable it to flower. ”

“ The herbalists seem to have attempted to keep their business select by fencing it about with all manner of superstitions, most of which have for their moral that herb-collecting is too dangerous an occupation for the uninitiated. Theophrastus draws attention to the absurdity of some of the root-diggers’ directions for gathering medicinal plants. ”

“ Perhaps the most obvious of these is the incalculable debt which Botany owes to Medicine. An overwhelming majority of the herbalists were physicians, who were led to the study of botany on account of its connection with the arts of healing. As we have already pointed out, medicine gave the original impulse, not only to Systematic Botany, but also to the study of the Anatomy of Plants.
However, as the evolution of the herbal proceeded, we have shown that botany rose from being a mere hand-maid of medicine to a position of comparative independence. ”

“ The decoction of the herb, both leaves and flowers, in wine, taken and drank, doth somewhat move the belly downwards, opens obstructions of the liver, and helps the yellow jaundice; expels poison, provokes women’s courses, drives forth the dead child, and after-birth. The distilled water of the herb and flowers is effectual for all the same purposes; being drank with a dram of the powder of the seeds of bark or the roots of Wall-wort, and a little Cinnamon, for certain days together, it is held a singular remedy for the dropsy. ”

“ When eaten raw, it both clears the sight and the perceptions of the mind, and when cooked it destroys fleas. The English herbalists called it Herb Grace and Serving-men’s Joy, because of the multiplicity of ailments that it was warranted to cure ”

“ Turning to the herbals themselves, we find that the earliest show no trace of a natural grouping, the plants being, as a rule, arranged alphabetically. This is the case, for instance, in the Latin and German Herbarius, the Ortus Sanitatis and their derivatives, and even in the herbals of Brunfels and of Fuchs in the sixteenth century. In Bock’s herbal, on the other hand, the plants are grouped as herbs, shrubs and trees, according to the classical scheme. ”

“ Another very early book based on classical writings, especially those of Dioscorides and Pliny, was the ‘Herbarium’ of Apuleius Platonicus. This little Latin work is among the earliest to which the term “Herbal” is generally applied. A herbal has been defined as a book containing the names and descriptions of herbs, or of plants in general, with their properties and virtues. ”

“ Its young branches, flowers, and seeds, after maceration in water, yield a volatile oil which is chemically identical with that of the bitter almond. The flowers are laxative, and have been used instead of manna. When distilled, they furnish a white liquor which communicates a flavour resembling the kernels of fruits. An infusion made from one drachm of the dried flowers, or from half an ounce of the fresh flowers, has a purgative effect. The fruit is wholesome, and seldom disagrees if eaten when ripe and sound. Its quantity of sugar is only small, but the skin is indigestible. ”

“ As, however, the shoots will not be well furnished with leaves, when several years old, it will be proper to raise an annual stock of young plants.
Both the summer and winter savory have long been cultivated in the British gardens, for culinary, and medicinal purposes. Their warm aromatic, and pungent leaves, are much esteemed in salads: formerly, they were employed medicinally, with a view to attenuate viscid humours, to dispel flatulency, and to increase the appetite.—According to Prof. Bradley, this herb, when dry, and put into a bed, possesses the remarkable property of expelling fleas. ”

“ Hence it had happened that Rue, Hyssop, Fennel, Mustard, Elecampane, Southernwood, Celandine, Radish, Cummin, Onion, Lupin, Chervil, Fleur de Luce, Flax (probably) , Rosemary, Savory, Lovage, Parsley, Coriander, Alexanders, or Olusatrum, the black pot herb, Savin, and other useful herbs, were already of common growth for kitchen uses, or for medicinal purposes. ”

“ English Plants are drawn from Nature to the greatest Accuracy, Flowers, or Parts, too small to be distinguished, are magnified. Nothing in any Language exceeds this Thirty Years laborious Work, of which may truly be said that Nature only equals it, every Thing of the Kind, hitherto attempted, being trivial, compared to this inimitable Performance. Designed to promote Botanical Knowledge, prevent Mistakes in the Use of Simples in compounding and preparing Medicines, to illustrate, and render such Herbals as want the Just Representations in their proper Figures and Colour more useful. ”

“ There is a small onion to give a taste—in the other is a good herb, called Lord have mercy on us. These, and many other holy herbs are contained in it, all boiling in the heart of man, will make as good pottage as the world can afford, especially if you use these herbs for digestion. The herb repentance, the herb grace, the herb faith, the herb love, the herb hope, the herb good works, the herb feeling, the herb zeal, the herb fervency, the herb ardency, the herb constancy, with many more of this nature, most excellent for digestion. ”

“ It grows abundantly in our dry chalky pastures, bearing terminal umbels of white flowers. It contains an essential oil and a bitter resin, which are useful as warmly carminative to relieve flatulent indigestion, and to promote the monthly flow in women. An infusion of the herb is made, and given in two tablespoonfuls for a dose. Cows which feed on this plant have their flow of milk increased thereby. Small bunches of the leaves and shoots when tied together and suspended in a cask of beer impart to it an agreeable aromatic flavour, and are thought to correct tart, or spoiled wines. ”

“ The best epoch in the history of the herbal, from the point of view of book-illustration, is confined within much narrower limits than the two centuries we have been considering. The suggestion has been made, and seems thoroughly justified, that the finest period should be reckoned as falling between 1530 and 1614, that is, between the wood-cuts of Hans Weiditz in Brunfels’ ‘Herbarum vivæ eicones,’ and the copper-plates of Crispian de Passe in the ‘Hortus Floridus.’ This good period thus lasted less than one hundred years, and belongs chiefly to the sixteenth century. ”

“ Whenever these peculiarities co–exist in a plant, we may be sure that there is nothing deleterious about it. More than fifty different plants formed on this plan grow wild in England, and considerably over two thousand in foreign countries, and not one of them is in the least degree noxious, either to quadruped or to man. Many are aromatic, and used with food, as thyme, sage, mint, basil, and penny–royal; while others are useful for medicinal tea, as balm and ground–ivy. ”

“ We have the herb for food as in case of hunger, for narcotic as in case of insomnia, for anodyne as in case of paroxysm, for stimulant as when the pulses flag under the weight of disease. The caterer comes and takes the herb and presents it in all styles of delicacy. The physician comes and takes the herb and compounds it for physical recuperation. Millions of people come and take the herb for ruinous physical and intellectual delectation. The herb, which was divinely created, and for good purposes, has often been degraded for bad results. ”

“ Neither to be discovered in the quaint Herbals of primitive times, nor to be learnt by the advanced chemical knowledge of modern plant lore, is there any panacea for all the ills to which our flesh is heir, or an elixir of life, which can secure for us a perpetual immunity from sickness. Contra vim mortis nullum medicamentum in hortis, says the rueful Latin distich:—
"No healing herb can conquer death,
And so for always give us breath." ”

“ The juice heated with the oil of Roses, and dropped into the ears, eases them of the noise and singing in them, and of deafness also. Outwardly applied with wheat flour, in manner of a poultice, it gives ease to the sciatica and palsied members, heating and warming them, and takes away their pains. It also takes away the pain that comes by stinging of bees, wasps, &c.
SAVINE.
To describe a plant so well known is needless, it being nursed up almost in every garden, and abides green all the Winter. ”

“ The medicinal properties of plants are thus the outcome of qualities that are not obvious at sight. How, then, is the physician to be guided in selecting herbal remedies to cure the several ailments of his patients? The answer to this question given by Paracelsus is summed up in what is known as the Doctrine of Signatures. ”

“ Much of the old Saxon herb lore is to be found in the leech books of the Middle Ages, but, with one notable exception, no important original treatise on herbs by an English writer has come down to us from that period. The vast majority of the herbal MSS. are merely transcriptions of Macer’s herbal, a mediæval Latin poem on the virtues of seventy-seven plants, which is believed to have been written in the tenth century. ”

“ Those plants of whose greenness withered we make herb tea for the sick, serve but a humble use, and are most employed by quacks. I want the flower and fruit of a man; that some fragrance be wafted over from him to me, and some ripeness flavor our intercourse. ”

“ To see a well cut herbal, hearbs, trees, flowers, plants, all vegetals, expressed in their proper colours to the life, as that of Matthiolus upon Dioscorides, Delacampius, Lobel, Bauhinus, and that last voluminous and mighty herbal of Besler of Noremberge; wherein almost every plant is to his own bignesse. ”

“ It helps to expel the wind in the belly. The green herb with the root taken fresh, being bruised and applied to the head, takes away the pains and prickings there, stays rheum and thin distillation, and being boiled in white wine, and a drop thereof put into the eyes, takes away the dimness of the sight, or any pin or web therein. It is of excellent property to heal any inward sores or wounds, and also for outward hurts or wounds, and drawing away splinters or thorns out of the flesh.
VERVAIN. ”