Herbal Lore
Plants and preparations as myth, tradition and folklore told of them — each claim dated and attributed. Folk and traditional use as told, not medical advice.
Where to begin
Herbal Lore · 1775
Foxglove
Fairy fingers, and a poison
Digitalis purpurea, a poisonous biennial with tall spires of purple, thimble-shaped flowers.
What it meansIrish country belief held foxglove a fairy plant. A pining child was thought fairy-struck and given its juice; for a changeling, a witch-woman prescribed it until the fairies' power should cease.
The FindingMother Hutton, said to have sold Withering the foxglove secret, comes from a 1928 Parke-Davis advertisement. Withering names only an old woman in Shropshire.
Herbal Lore · around 2500 BCE
Frankincense and Myrrh
Resins for Gods, Kings and the Dead
Resins of Arabia and the Horn of Africa: frankincense (Boswellia) and myrrh (Commiphora).
What it meansIrenaeus read the Magi's gifts as a confession: myrrh for his death, gold for a king, frankincense for God.
The FindingHerodotus (c. 430 BCE) called Arabia the only land of frankincense and myrrh. Egypt took myrrh from Punt two millennia earlier: Sahure 80,000 measures, Hatshepsut 31 living trees.
Herbal Lore · the 70s CE
Vervain
The Holy Plant of Envoys
Verbena officinalis, a wiry, square-stemmed European plant with spikes of small lilac flowers.
What it meansThe holy plant cleansed and consecrated: it went with envoys to the enemy, swept Jupiter's table and purified houses. Christian charmers blessed it as first found on Calvary.
The FindingPliny credits divining with vervain to the Gauls and names the druids only for mistletoe, selago and samolus. Philemon Holland's 1601 translation made the Gauls druids.