Fw: THE HISTORY OF HERBAL MEDICINE IN NORTH AMERICA (Part One)

November 29, 2003

-

" Frank " <califpacific

Saturday, November 29, 2003 1:55 AM

THE HISTORY OF HERBAL MEDICINE IN

NORTH AMERICA (Part One)

http://www.redflagsweekly.com/caldecott/2003_nov13.html

THE HISTORY OF HERBAL MEDICINE IN NORTH AMERICA

(Part One)

By RFD Columnist, Todd Caldecott

of Clinical Herbal Studies

Wild Rose College Of Natural Healing

Calgary, Alberta

Email: phyto

Website

In this major series, RFD Columnist, Todd Caldecott explores the history of

herbal medicine in North America, with the view of fostering a better

understanding of the issues that face modern herbalists and a greater

appreciation of the evolution of the relationships between alternative,

complimentary and conventional medicine.

Herbal medicine in North America has a long and venerable tradition, from

the First Nations practices that were in existence thousands of years before

the first colonists arrived, to the development of four-year clinical

programs at the turn of the last century.

On November 9, of 1620, the tall masts of the Mayflower drifted past the

shores of the New World, along the coast of what is today called

Massachusetts, after 66 days at sea. The crossing had been difficult.

Shortly after it left port at Plymouth on the southwest coast of England,

severe storms and crosswinds buffeted the Mayflower, causing a crack in a

beam between decks and the upper works to leak badly. At one point

conditions were so bad that many of the passengers raised questions about

the ship's sea-worthiness, but after much debate it was decided that they

should go on, as they were nearly halfway across the Atlantic Ocean.

On November 11, the Mayflower set anchor in what is today Provincetown

harbor. The passengers and crew went aboard to shake off their sea legs and

explore what they thought was for the most part empty wilderness, although

they certainly had foreknowledge of the mysterious " red Indians " that

inhabited the land. The crew constructed a shallop, a small coastal craft,

and over the next few weeks a small band of well-armed men braved the bitter

weather to explore the coastline to find a location to settle. The explorers

spotted some Native peoples from afar, and uncovered a few caches of corn in

their explorations. On the third expedition the explorers arrived in what is

today Plymouth harbor, and seeing the grassy meadows and abundant creeks,

chose it as the location for their settlement. On December 16, the Mayflower

anchored in Plymouth harbor, and a week later the Pilgrims began the

construction of their settlement. It was a hard lot however, during this

first shivering winter in the

New World, and the settlers suffered from the ravages of exposure,

malnutrition, scurvy and infectious disease. By winter's end, more than half

the colonists and crew were dead.

As spring slowly emerged, the colonists began to glimpse the occasional sign

of some " red Indians, " but it wasn't until March 1621 that the two peoples

met. The First Nations people that lived in this area of the Eastern

Woodlands were the Wampanoag, and to this point their impression of the

European explorers was most unfavorable. In previous visits, heavily armed

and foul-smelling English soldiers had come ashore and antagonized the

Wampanoag with hungry mastiffs, and made boorish advances towards their

women that no respectable man would ever have done. A lieutenant named

Thomas Hunt had kidnapped twenty-seven Wampanoag men against the orders of

his superior, and sold them as slaves in Spain. But on this occasion, as

they quietly watched the settlers, the Wampanoag observed that these white

men were somewhat different, and had brought women and children with them.

Although the intention of the settlers was unclear, the Wampanoag were

eventually satisfied that these people at least

were not here to make war. After much deliberation, the leader of the

Wampanoag nation, Massasoit, sent the English-speaking Samoset to meet the

colonists. Samoset was an Abenaki Sagamore from what is now called Maine,

and had learned to speak English from the English fisherman that crossed the

Atlantic to jig for cod. He explained to the colonists that a plague had

ravaged the Patuxet people, some 2000 of them, and the cleared land the

colonists were now settled on was formerly a Patuxet settlement. On his

second visit, Samoset returned with Tisquantum, a Patuxet of the Wampanoag

nation that had been captured a few years before by Thomas Hunt and sold

into slavery in Spain. While being held captive Tisquantum had learned of

the insatiable desire of the Europeans for gold, and was able to escape and

make it back to his people by convincing treasure-hungry explorers that he

could show them where to find it. Tisquantum would later prove to be an

invaluable resource for the new colony,

acting as their translator.

After these two visits, Massasoit approached the new settlement, and sent

Samoset and Tisquantum to bring the English to meet with him. An Englishman

named Winslow volunteered for the meeting, and brought a few tokens to

represent their friendly intent. Bringing Winslow back with him, Massasoit

entered the English village and negotiated a treaty between the Wampanoag

and the colonists. This treaty agreed that the two peoples would be allies

in times of war, that perpetrators of crimes against either people would be

handed over for punishment, that stolen property would be returned to the

rightful owners, and that no weapons would be brought into each others

community. It was an important agreement, observed by both sides for well

over a half a century.

Based on this new friendship, the Wampanoag assisted their struggling

neighbors, imparting many skills such as deer hunting, knowledge of wild

plants, and how to cultivate corn. The colonists were pleased the following

summer to see how well the corn was growing, even though their pea, barley,

and wheat crops had failed. That fall the colonists and Wampanoag gathered

together and celebrated their communal relationship in a three-day harvest

festival, beginning what has become an important secular holiday in North

America called Thanksgiving.

Apart from the obvious sentimentality with which many Americans look back

upon this occasion, the truth of the matter was that this Thanksgiving would

only prove to be one-sided. Short on the heels on the Mayflower's arrival,

several other ships carried new settlers to Plymouth, hungry to make a new

life in the vast expanse of the New World. Soon the bulging population of

new immigrants encroached upon the planting and hunting grounds of the

Wampanoag people, much to their distress. Between 1631 and 1633, another

small pox epidemic exploded, killing many colonists, and among them Plymouth

colony's physician, Dr. Samuel Fuller. The true impact of the small pox

epidemic however was felt most by the Wampanoag, who were laid waste to its

desolation. This pattern of small pox epidemics continued to ripple

throughout the First Nations all across the Americas over the succeeding

years.

In their first visits to the shores of North America, early English

explorers were impressed with the First Peoples they met, bringing back

stories of a " super-race, " free of the disease, deformities and pestilence

that marked the urban landscape of England. In 1633, adventurer William Wood

wrote of his visits with the First Peoples " I have beene in many places, yet

did I never see one that was born. a monster, or any sickness had deformed,

or casualty made decrepid. " This perception, in part, fueled a substantial

interest in exotic plant medicines brought back from the New World, such as

Sassafras (Sassafras albidum) and Tobacco (Nicotiana rusticum). But perhaps

nowhere else other than in the colonies was this interest as strong in the

healing potential of the " red man's " herbal repertory. With the epidemic

taking their only physician, the colonists at Plymouth began to rely upon

the herbal lore taught to them by the Wampanoag and other Eastern Woodland

peoples. This interest was

especially keen in colonist housewives, who having little access to medical

care, relied upon this knowledge to keep their families healthy. In time,

these herbal remedies entered into common usage, although the physicians

that eventually immigrated to the colonies frowned upon their usage. To

stock the greater part of their dispensaries, these physicians continued to

import huge volumes of Old World medicines such as Jalap (Ipomoea jalapa),

Senna (Cassia angustifolia), and Myrrh (Commiphora mukul), as well as toxic

minerals like mercury, gold and antimony. The growing antipathy of

professional physicians towards simple herbal remedies was certainly

intensified by their disdain for the shamanic healing practices of the " red

savages, " whose ritualistic singing, chanting and rattling must have been

observed by these physicians as a kind of primitive and even devilish

practice.

For all the differences between European and First Nations medicine however,

the principle of health among the First Nations people was remarkably

similar to that of Hippocratic medicine. There was a general belief among

the First Nations people that disease was a kind of impurity that must be

cleansed from the body. To this end, the healers and shamans of the First

Nations employed a variety of simple plant remedies, as well as a kind of

sauna commonly referred to as a sweat lodge, to remove these impurities.

Although equipped with comparatively primitive tools, these healers and

shamans were exceptionally skilled herbalists, equipped with an ability to

" read " the plants of the forests and choose a remedy that was appropriate to

an individual's malady. These practitioners also had an ingenious ability to

prepare and apply these plant remedies in many different ways. Their

knowledge however was never codified, never written down, and only expressed

through the words and example of an

experienced healer. Most of these skills unfortunately were never shared

completely with the European settlers, and with the assault on their

culture, we only have the barest sketch of their practices. One notable

exception is the Englishman John Josselyn, who after coming to New England

in 1663, engaged in an enthusiastic study of the local resources. In 1672

Josselyn published his book New Englands Rarities Discovered, detailing the

eight years of research he had conducted. Of all his studies, Josselyn was

most impressed by the knowledge and skills of the First Nations herbalists.

Scurvy was ever present for the colonists, and Josselyn was shown how

bearberries (Arctostaphylos uva ursi), naturally rich in ascorbic acid, were

exceptional in the treatment of scurvy. Josselyn related that abscesses were

easily resolved and healed with the boiled bark of Western Hemlock (Tsuga

canadensis), crushed and applied as a poultice, and that Cherry Bark (Prunus

virginiana) was an important

remedy for excessive or prolonged menstrual bleeding.

CONTINUING HERE

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