by Nicholas Culpeper
Microcosm Publishing
2/30/3034, booklet
SKU: 9781648414473
Seventeenth-century herbalist Nicholas Culpeper catalogs herbs according to which part to use—the root, the bark, the flower, the leaf, the fruit—and which ailments each plant was used to treat in the England of his day. For instance, ginger "takes away windiness of the womb" and licorice root "helps the hoarseness of the windpipe." This makes for a strange and illuminating reading experience: The brain of sparrows? Great for provoking lust. Pearls? Excellent for the heart. Excerpted from the original text, these entries are both entertaining and historically relevant.
About the Author:
Nicholas Culpeper (18 October 1616 - 10 January 1654) was an English botanist, herbalist, physician and astrologer. His book, The English Physician (1652, later Complete Herbal, 1653 ff.), is a source of pharmaceutical and herbal lore of the time, and Astrological Judgement of Diseases from the Decumbiture of the Sick (1655) was one of the most detailed works on medical astrology in Early Modern Europe.