Herbal Medicine
Herbal medicine is probably the oldest form of medicine known to mankind and has been used for thousands of years. A 60,000 year old burial site excavated in Iraq was found to contain 8 different medicinal plants, and there are many other examples of this.
Over thousands of years herbal medicine has been the primary form of medicine used by mankind – even in the present day the World Health Organisation estimates that up to 80% of the world’s population still uses herbal medicine.
In the present day up to 70% of pharmaceutical drugs are based on substances that were originally isolated from plants and 25% of medicines are still synthesized from plant material. In their search for new products many pharmaceutical companies are turning to old herbals and traditional healers for ideas.
Herbal medicine has been used as domestic folk medicine by rural communities and also formed the main bulk of the pharmacopeia of orthodox medicine until relatively recent times. In Western Europe herbal medicinal knowledge included learning from classical Greek, Roman, Egyptian and Arabic texts, as well as knowledge from local healers. In the Dark Age some of the most respected centres for learning were based in the Celtic world, particularly Myddfai, in Wales and in Ireland.
From the 11th century medical schools were founded in Europe, along with botanical gardens to instruct students in the recognition, cultivation and use of plants. The first was in Salerno, in Italy. Again, it is only in recent times that botany was dropped from the curriculum of medical schools.
Now there is a resurgence in interest in the use of herbs for medicine as people seek more natural remedies with less side effects.
References:
• Chevallier A. ‘The Encyclopedia of Medicinal Plants’, p. 16, London 1996. Dorling Kindersley
