New Stone Age 8,000 to 5,000 B.C. Europe
- Transition from the paleolithic to neolithic period…from a food gathering
to a food producing economy.
- Stone was polished, creating tools to clear trees, help farming.
- Lake-dwellers cultivated or gathered over two hundred different plants,
among which are not a few that possess medicinal qualities (Papaver somniferum
L., Sambucus ebulus L., Fumaria officinalis L., Verbena
officinalis L., Saponaria officinalis, Menyanthes trifoliata L.,
etc.).(1)
- In the history of herbalism, women prepared food and healing potions–women
generally practiced herbalism on a day to day basis, as well as took care
of the ills of other members of the family or tribal unit(2). However, throughout
history, men compiled the remedies and wrote them down, which is why nearly
all the herbals are by men.
- Chimpanzees have been seen to self-select medicinal herbs for treatment
of disease.
- Early mind-body medicine is seen to be practiced in the many rituals,
magic rites, beliefs of higher beings affecting health and disease, etc.
This was especially prevalent up until the time of the Egyptians (2500 B.C.),
when “rational” medicine began to rise, and continued to run concurrent
with religious and magical medicine.
- Magic, religion, and medicine are one to the primitive mind. The belief
in spirits that reside in animate and inanimate objects of man’s environment,
in the elements of nature, spirits that interfere in man’s life for good
or evil and therefore may cause disease, is extremely widespread, in fact
almost universal(3).
- Most primitive tribes today posses an expert knowledge of medicinal
plants, which number at times to hundreds(4).
Egypt
- Menes, the founder of the 1st Dynasty united Upper and Lower Egypt around
3000 B.C–but the land along the nile had been inhabited for thousands of
years before that.5 The Secret Book of the Heart tells of 3 kinds of healers,
the physician, the priest and the sorcerer.
- The most complete medical documents existing are the Ebers Papyrus (1550
B.C.) and the Edwin Smith Papyrus (1600 B.C.)(6). However, the the Kahun
Medical Papyrus was the oldest that has been translated–it comes from 1900
B.C. and deals with the health of women, including birthing instructions.
- Commonly used herbs included, senna, honey, thyme, juniper, frankincense,
cumin, colocynth (all for digestion); pomegranate root, henbane (for worms)
as well as flax, oakgall, pine-tar, manna, bayberry, ammi, alkanet, Acanthus,
aloe, caraway, cedar, coriander, cyperus, elderberry, fennel, garlic, wild
lettuce, nasturtium, onion, peppermint, papyrus, poppy-plant, saffron, sycamore,
watermelon, wheat and zizyphus-lotus(7).
Babylonian and Syrian medicine formed a bridge between Egypt and Greece
and flourished between 1000 and 2000 B.C.
Greece
- Much of the early Greek medical knowledge came over from Egypt(8). In
Dioscordes work, De Materia Medica (ca. 55 A.D.), a number of the
recipes are the same as listed in Papyrus Ebers, and prescribed for the
same ailments. Although Dioscorides was considered the absolute authority
in materia medica for over 1600 years, it is important to note that knowledge
of herbs and healing was handed down from one generation and culture to
the next, and thus belongs to no one man, woman or individual, but to humanity.
- As is well-known, the Greeks were highly skilled in medicine and materia
medica. The following sources come down to us from the ancient period of
about 500 B.C. to 60 A.D.
1. Hippokrates: usually considered an entire school of “rational”
or scientific” medicine, though the individual may also have lived.
Hippokrates may also have been the first “nature doctor” in a
more modern sense, for he utilized simple natural remedies such as vinegar,
honey, herbs and hydrotherapy in healing. He emphasized prevention and healthful
living. Many works survive and have been translated from the original Greek.
The work that is of the greatest interest to herbalists today is Dierbach’s
The Medicine of Hippokrates (in German). All of the 257 drugs mentioned
in this work are listed and compared to modern Pharmacognosy texts by Riddle(9).
Only 27 of these are not listed as medicinal plants today, some of which
are now considered foods.
2. Theophrastus (340 B.C.) wrote on natural history and botany–his work
Inquiry into Plants survives and is available in English translation(10).
He writes of many kinds of plants and how they are used in medicine, how
to grow them and many other observations.
3. Pliny’s (60 A.D.) Natural History is the largest compellation on plants
from the Greek period. Although Pliny was not very critical, he reports
from the writings of many authors whose work does not survive, so is a valuable
resource for the medicinal uses of plants in ancient medicine. Pliny lists
more plants than Dioscorides or any of the other ancient writers.
4. Krateus is a Greek herbalist who is considered the first person to produce
an illustrated work on medicinal plants(11). Pliny speaks of his illustrated
“herbal,” which does not unfortunately, survive. His influence
is thought to be felt in the De Materia Medica of Dioscorides, as well as
other later works on medicinal plants.
5. Dioscorides is the greatest and most influential ancient Greek writer
on materia medica. He was supposedly a physician in Nero’s army and thus
traveled far and wide gathering, using and studying plants and recording
the folk uses of many herbs as well. The influence on future generations,
even until the 1700s can not be overestimated. His work was considered absolute,
and his work was copied, recopied and commented on for 1600 years. The earliest
surviving manuscript is the Codex Vindobonensis from 512 A.D. This magnificent
work was illustrated with about 400 full-page hand-colored plates and was
made for the daughter of Flavius Anicius Olybrius, Emperor of the West in
472. An English translation of Dioscorides (by Goodyer) was published by
Gunther(12), unfortunately now out of print, but available in libraries
and occasionally seen second-hand. For additional perspective and analysis
of Dioscorides, see Riddle(13).
Middle Ages
Throughout the history of humans, science, art and consciousness has
been kindled from time to time to an especially bright flame. During these
times, knowledge and awareness of health and disease increased dramatically,
at times influencing people for generations until the flame rekindled in
another time and place. In the middle ages, taken here to mean the long
period between Greek and Roman culture and the Renaissance, several “schools”
of medicine which contributed substantially to the progression of herbalism
can be noted. But it must be remembered that these times were built from
the day to day practice of herbalism and investigation of the natural world.
As has been mentioned before, it is mostly men who wrote down and compiled
the works we have to go by when considering the history of herbalism, but
it was both men and women who practiced and developed herbalism–perhaps
women more than men on a day to day basis. Payne, in his English Medicine
in the Anglo-Saxon Times supports this by saying, that in European medicine
(especially among the Germanic Tribes) “Medicine was largely practised
by women; and Tacitus relates that warriors wounded in battle brought their
wounds to their mothers and wives to be attended to(14). The following outline
details briefly the major sources of information during this period.
Arabian School
During the period from about 700 A.D. until 1300 A.D., the flowering
of all branches of knowledge was magnificent. Many works were written about
medicine, health and disease, pharmacy and materia medica–most of which
are extant, but in Persian. Two works on materia medica have been translated
into English (The Formulary of Al Kindi and that of Al-Samarqandi) and are
available(l5, 16). From them it can be seen that the practice of herbalism
was brought to a high degree of skill.
Anglo-Saxon Leechcraft (512-1154)
Leech was the collective English word for medical practitioners–those
who practiced all forms of healing. Several works survive from Anglo-Saxon
medicine in England, among them Herbarium Apuleius (480-1050), one of the
most copied herbal manuscripts, available in modern English . This work
contains recipes and uses of over 100 herbs(17). Another work available
in modern English is the Leechbook of Bald (925), (18) containing
may formulas and herbal remedies in a fairly sophisticated system of therapeutics,
but many superstitious notions about how to apply herbal treatments as well.
Meanwhile, a number of generations of the family Myddvai practiced herbalism
in a highly artful degree, their herbal therapies were written down ir.
the work, Physicians of Myddvai (1250), which is available in modern
English, though out of print (19).
Salerno
The school of Salerno or Salernum (11th to the 1 2th century) in Italy
was a famous and influential medical and health center, epitomized by the
work of the Christian physician, Constantine the African (20), who is generally
credited with the introduction of Arabian medicine into Europe. Two works
(in English) are notable, Experiments of Cohpon (1080) and the famous
poem of health, Regimen Sanitatis Salerni (21).
Table 1 Uses of Herbs in Medical History
PERIOD
SCHOOL DATE USES
Ancient Medicine
Egyptian Medicine
Papyrus Ebers 1550 B.C. 1
Greek Medicine
Hippocrates 450 BC 2
Theophrastus 340 BC 3
Pliny 60 AD 4
Dioscorides 160 AD 5
Middle Ages
Arabians
Al-Kindi 850 6
Al-Samarqandi 1210 7
Saxon Leechcraft
Herbarium Apuleius 480-1050 8
Hildegard of Bingen 1099-1179 9
Physicians of Myddvai 1250 10
Salerno
Experiments of Cohpon 1080 11
Renaissance
Age of Herbalism
Paracelsus 1493-1541 12
Banks 1525 13
Brunfels 1542 14
Dodoens 1554 15
Gerard 1597 16
Parkinson 1640 17
Official Medicine in Europe
Ph. Londenensis 1618 18
Ph. Universalis 1747 19
Lewis 1791 20
Cullen 1802 21
Pereira 1838 22
American Medicine
Colonial Medicine
Bartram 1751 23
19th century medicine
Barton 1818 24
Bigelow 1822 25
Eberle 1822 26
Griffith 1847 27
USP 1820- 28
NF 1888- 29
King/Felter/Lloyd 1898 30
Use in Asia, other Cultures
China (TCM)
Smith & Stuart 1578 (?) 31
Perry 1980 32
India (Ayurveda)
Ainslie 1826 33
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University Press (vol 1, p. 108).
2. ibid.
3. ibid, p. 135. [ The Cherokees, in America, know many spirits
that are neither good nor evil, but when these are offended, when they feel
provoked by man, they hit back and cause sickness. Thus the spirit of fire
is resentful when a person throws the offal of anything he has chewed into
the fire, and the result is a toothache….the river ‘sends disease to those
who insult it by such actions as throwing rubbish into it..”]
4. ibid., p. 203.
5. ibid., p. 226.
6. Ebbell, B., trans. 1937. rhe Papyrus Ebers. Copenhagen: Levin
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7. Bryan, C.P., tr. 1931. rhe Papyrus Ebers. NewYork: D. Appleton
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8. ibid,p. 25.
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15. Levey, M. 1966. The Medical Formulary or Aqrabadhin of Al-Kindi.
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18. ibid.
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6