Roman Medicine

[Andrew Dalby]

That is certainly of help to me, AD - it clears things up very well. As for Valerian - I remember having cough medicine with Valerian in it when I was a child! It was a black linctus and had a sort of liquorice/aniseed taste - but I should imagine that was some sort of flavouring to make it palatable to children.

 

It sounds worse than the pink linctus they used to make me have when I was ill. They claimed it was strawberry-flavoured, but I knew better.

[Lost_Warrior]

I thought lavendar was commonly used in army medicine. "Lavendar water"?

[Pertinax]

Erratum: on my part, Ploughmans Spikenard is an inula: im guilty of the ancient/modern mixup that I try to avoid! I knew AD would, when not gathering branches and roots for his modest bothy , deliver the definitive answer.

[Gaius Octavius]

Erratum: on my part, Ploughmans Spikenard is an inula: im guilty of the ancient/modern mixup that I try to avoid! I knew AD would, when not gathering branches and roots for his modest bothy , deliver the definitive answer.

 

:notworthy: Bothy? http://www.mountainbothies.org.uk/

 

[Andrew Dalby]

I thought lavendar was commonly used in army medicine. "Lavendar water"?

 

I suspect it's a false identification ... but I am always happy to be proved wrong! What's the source for this lavender water, do we know?

 

 

Erratum: on my part, Ploughmans Spikenard is an inula: im guilty of the ancient/modern mixup that I try to avoid! I knew AD would, when not gathering branches and roots for his modest bothy , deliver the definitive answer.

 

:notworthy: Bothy? http://www.mountainbothies.org.uk/

 

 

Even French bothies take a deal of heating, I can tell you. It was minus 8 when we were chopping wood yesterday. But thank goodness our landscape is a little less 'Spartan' than those illustrated in the link. Tomatoes do nicely here in summer -- they wouldn't in the Scottish Highlands, I suspect.

[Gaius Paulinus Maximus]

I thought lavendar was commonly used in army medicine. "Lavendar water"?

 

I suspect it's a false identification ... but I am always happy to be proved wrong! What's the source for this lavender water, do we know?

 

 

 

According to the German nun Hildegard of Bingen who lived from 1098-1179, lavender "water", a decoction of vodka, gin, or brandy mixed with lavender, is great for migraine headaches.

 

Have a look at this site about the history of Lavender

 

http://www.lavenderfarm.com/history.htm

[WotWotius]

Now that is a very interesting question: if you remember my review of Cruse's book on medicine , I noted that finds of Roman teeth indicated greater physical wear overall (in view of the denser, fibrous diet) but less carious and decayed teeth (no sugar save honey). I myself have been given a gift of twigs from the "toothbrush tree" (Neem) by Bengali friends , and these fibrous but (relativly) soft twigs are clean tasting and give sufficient abrasion to keep the teeth clean.

 

I remember reading somewhere (please do not ask me to recall the book...) about various facts about the state of Roman dentures: current archaeology indicates that the teeth of the average legionary were much more worn-down than that of the average Roman citizen; this was most probably as a result of the additional grit in flour made by the Roman army.

 

Is this true?

[Gaius Octavius]

WW, take a gander at post #68.

[Andrew Dalby]

I thought lavendar was commonly used in army medicine. "Lavendar water"?

 

I suspect it's a false identification ... but I am always happy to be proved wrong! What's the source for this lavender water, do we know?

 

 

 

According to the German nun Hildegard of Bingen who lived from 1098-1179, lavender "water", a decoction of vodka, gin, or brandy mixed with lavender, is great for migraine headaches.

 

Have a look at this site about the history of Lavender

 

http://www.lavenderfarm.com/history.htm

 

They have gone in for the confusion of lavender with spikenard. On the whole, you can't trust people who aim to sell herbs to teach you real history. Vodka, gin and brandy -- and all alcoholic spirits -- were not available to Hildegard of Bingen, so that can't be right. Sorry to be negative -- it's a nice site!

[Pertinax]

I personaly consume gin and calvados , just in case I might be getting a migraine.

 

Re-enactors commonly suggest "lavender water" as an antiseptic for wounds , which did puzzle me as acetum would be perfect for wound cleansing and available in copious quantities (indeed its more effective than carbolic).

[Andrew Dalby]

I personaly consume gin and calvados , just in case I might be getting a migraine.

 

Re-enactors commonly suggest "lavender water" as an antiseptic for wounds , which did puzzle me as acetum would be perfect for wound cleansing and available in copious quantities (indeed its more effective than carbolic).

 

If reenactors go around smelling of lavender, I'm sure that's all to the good. As a practical panacea, however, I, like you, would tend to choose Calvados. But even Jack Daniel's, although distilled somewhere on the other side of Atlantis, has been known to have a salutary effect.

[Pertinax]

I have no deep seated objection to fragrant smelling re-enactors.

 

I did mention the Inula species (above) as well known ancient (and modern ) medicaments , the following extract from Grieve (after Culpepper) hints at a wide range of uses , though today it is mainly used as part of cough medicine formulae:

 

"Inula, the Latin classical name for the plant, is considered to be a corruption of the Greek word Helenion which in its Latinized form, Helenium, is also now applied to the same species. There are many fables about the origin of this name. Gerard tells us: 'It took the name Helenium of Helena, wife of Menelaus, who had her hands full of it when Paris stole her away into Phrygia.' Another legend states that it sprang from her tears: another that Helen first used it against venomous bites; a fourth, that it took the name from the island Helena, where the best plants grew.

 

Vegetius Renatus about the beginning of the fifth century, calls it Inula campana, and St. Isidore, in the beginning of the seventh, names it Inula, adding 'quam Alam rustici vocant.' By the mediaeval writers it was often written Enula. Elecampane is a corruption of the ante-Linnaean name Enula campana, so called from its growing wild in Campania.(Thats a rather prosaic touch is it not?)

 

The herb is of ancient medicinal repute, having been described by Dioscorides and Pliny. An old Latin distich celebrates its virtues: Enula campana reddit praecordia sana (Elecampane will the spirits sustain). 'Julia Augustus,' said Pliny, 'let no day pass without eating some of the roots of Enula, considered to help digestion and cause mirth.' The monks equally esteemed it as a cordial. Pliny affirmed that the root 'being chewed fasting, doth fasten the teeth,' and Galen that 'It is good for passions of the hucklebone called sciatica."

 

The actual chemical activity of the species is from its sesquiterpene lactones, being anti-inflammatory, anti protozoal and antimicrobial. A useful range of properties , feverfew and absinthum share this range of chemical actions.

 

PS Allen and Hatfield suggest that the plant is (in ethnobotanical terms) one of the great healing plants of antiquity that has slipped into semi-oblivion; they also note its use as a subsistence level food in early Christian Ireland -I thought using Arum starch as a bread (when Caesar's men were starving in the stand-off with Pompey) was pretty grim but this is a real macrobiotic slimming diet.

[Andrew Dalby]

The herb is of ancient medicinal repute, having been described by Dioscorides and Pliny. An old Latin distich celebrates its virtues: Enula campana reddit praecordia sana (Elecampane will the spirits sustain). 'Julia Augustus,' said Pliny, 'let no day pass without eating some of the roots of Enula, considered to help digestion and cause mirth.' The monks equally esteemed it as a cordial. Pliny affirmed that the root 'being chewed fasting, doth fasten the teeth,' and Galen that 'It is good for passions of the hucklebone called sciatica."

 

Isn't that the same Julia who was eventually exiled by Augustus for her ungovernable sexual appetites? Perhaps 'mirth' was the nearest Mrs Grieve felt she should go towards 'nymphomania'. I have noted that elecampane root is one of the products that sells particularly well at the big herbal store at Athens central market.

 

As for me, I've always wondered whether I suffer from passions of the hucklebone.

[Pertinax]

The herb is of ancient medicinal repute, having been described by Dioscorides and Pliny. An old Latin distich celebrates its virtues: Enula campana reddit praecordia sana (Elecampane will the spirits sustain). 'Julia Augustus,' said Pliny, 'let no day pass without eating some of the roots of Enula, considered to help digestion and cause mirth.' The monks equally esteemed it as a cordial. Pliny affirmed that the root 'being chewed fasting, doth fasten the teeth,' and Galen that 'It is good for passions of the hucklebone called sciatica."

 

Isn't that the same Julia who was eventually exiled by Augustus for her ungovernable sexual appetites? Perhaps 'mirth' was the nearest Mrs Grieve felt she should go towards 'nymphomania'. I have noted that elecampane root is one of the products that sells particularly well at the big herbal store at Athens central market.

 

As for me, I've always wondered whether I suffer from passions of the hucklebone.

 

Mrs Grieve is rather Victorian in her description of the libidinous humours.This all makes me rather nervous about the root being used as a subsistence food in remote Hibernian communities.

Your hucklebone is ,I think ,connected to your leg bone, so you are right to be afflicted by disquiet. A sturdy dose of Vitex agnus castus should calm any upwelling passions in this "seat" of troubles, (chasteberry being its common English name from its use as a monastic "food adittive").

Galen insists that the "seminal humors" be healthily discharged from the body as frequently as reasonably possible, to maintain vigour and mental clarity. Ibn Sinna is in accord with his teachings, and I find whilst perusing a modern Islamic medicinal text that this is suggested as being the most effective and virtuous activity for the health (within the legal framework of marriage of course), Galen being quoted directly ! So given Galen's ethnic origins I perceive an excellent symmetry in Inula's Attic popularity.

[Gaius Octavius]

Are the 'libidinous humors' enhanced by ingesting ground rhinoceros horn?