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THE ANGLO-SAXON HERBALS 1

LATER MANUSCRIPT HERBALS AND THE EARLY PRINTED HERBALS 42

TURNER'S HERBAL AND THE INFLUENCE OF THE FOREIGN HERBALISTS 75

GERARD'S HERBAL 98

HERBALS OF THE NEW WORLD 120

JOHN PARKINSON, THE LAST OF THE GREAT ENGLISH HERBALISTS 142

BIBLIOGRAPHIES

ENGLISH HERBALS 189

FOREIGN HERBALS 225

This list includes only the chief works and those which have some connection with the history of the herbal in England.

INDEX 237

AESCULAPIUS PLATO AND A CENTAUR FROM THE SAXON TRANSLATION OF THE "HERBARIUM OF APULEIUS" 10

MANDRAKE FROM A SAXON HERBAL 22

ARTEMISIA AND BLACKBERRY, FROM A SAXON HERBAL 30

FROM A SAXON HERBAL 40

WOODCUT OF TREES AND HERBS FROM THE SEVENTEENTH BOOK OF "DE PROPRIETATIBUS RERUM" 48

INITIAL LETTERS FROM "BANCKES'S HERBAL" 56

WOODCUT FROM THE TITLE-PAGE OF THE "GRETE HERBALL" 64

WOODCUT OF PETER TREVERIS' SIGN OF THE "WODOWS" FROM THE "GRETE HERBALL" 70

WOODCUT FROM THE TITLE-PAGE OF THE FOURTH EDITION OF THE "GRETE HERBALL" 71

PORTRAIT OF JOHN GERARD FROM THE FIRST EDITION OF THE "HERBALL" 104

TITLE-PAGE OF PARKINSON'S "PARADISUS" 144

TITLE-PAGE OF PARKINSON'S "THEATRUM BOTANICUM" 152

PORTRAIT OF JOHN PARKINSON FROM THE "PARADISUS" 160

NICHOLAS CULPEPER FROM "THE ENGLISH PHYSICIAN ENLARGED" 166

FRONTISPIECE OF "THE CURIOUS DESTILLATORY," BY THOMAS SHIRLEY, M.D., PHYSICIAN IN ORDINARY TO HIS MAJESTY 174

THE OLD ENGLISH HERBALS

THE ANGLO-SAXON HERBALS

"Everything possible to be believ'd is an image of truth." WILLIAM BLAKE.

Still more remarkable is the fact that beneath the superstructure of Christian rites to be used when the herbs were being picked or administered we find traces not merely of the ancient heathen religion, but of a religion older than that of Woden. It has been emphasised by our most eminent authorities that in very early times our ancestors had but few chief gods, and it is a remarkable fact that there is no mention whatever of Woden in the whole range of Saxon literature before the time of Alfred. In those earlier centuries they seem to have worshipped a personification of Heaven, and Earth, the wife of Heaven, and the Son, whom after ages called Thor. There were also Nature deities, Hrede, the personification of the brightness of Summer, and Eostra, the radiant creature of the Dawn. It will be remembered that it was the worship, not of Balder, but of Eostra, which the Christian missionaries found so deeply imbedded that they adopted her name and transferred it to Easter. For this we have the authority of Bede. Separate from these beneficent powers were the destroying and harmful powers of Nature--darkness, storm, frost and the deadly vapours of moorland and fen, personified in the giants, the ogres, the furious witches that rode the winds and waves; in fact, the whole horde of demons of sea and land and sky. It is the traces of these most ancient forms of religion which give to the manuscripts their strongest fascination.

Many of us miss all that is most worth learning in old books through regarding anything in them that is unfamiliar as merely quaint, if not ridiculous. This attitude seals a book as effectually and as permanently as it seals a sensitive human being. There is only one way of understanding these old writers, and that is to forget ourselves entirely and to try to look at the world of nature as they did. It is not "much learning" that is required, but sympathy and imagination. In the case of these Saxon manuscripts we are repaid a thousandfold; for they transport us to an age far older than our own, and yet in some ways so young that we have lost its magic key. For we learn not only of herbs and the endless uses our forefathers made of them, but, if we try to read them with understanding, these books open for us a magic casement through which we look upon the past bathed in a glamour of romance. Our Saxon ancestors may have been a rude and hardy race, but they did not live in an age of materialism as we do. In their writings on herbs and their uses we see "as through a glass darkly" a time when grown men believed in elves and goblins as naturally as they believed in trees, an age when it was the belief of everyday folk that the air was peopled with unseen powers of evil against whose machinations definite remedies must be applied. They believed, as indeed the people of all ancient civilisations have believed, that natural forces and natural objects were endued with mysterious powers whom it was necessary to propitiate by special prayers. Not only the stars of heaven, but springs of water and the simple wayside herbs, were to them directly associated with unseen beings. There are times when one is reminded forcibly of that worship of Demeter, "nearer to the Earth which some have thought they could discern behind the definitely national mythology of Homer." They believed that the sick could be cured by conjurations and charms, as firmly as we believe to-day in curing them by suggestion--is there any real difference between these methods?--and when one reads the charms which they used in administering their herbs one cannot help wondering whether these were handed down traditionally from the Sumerians, those ancient inhabitants of Mesopotamia who five thousand years before Christ used charms for curing the sick which have now been partially deciphered from the cuneiform inscriptions. But before studying the plant lore therein contained, it may be as well to take a preliminary survey of the four most important manuscripts.

The book itself was written under the direction of one Bald, who, if he were not a personal friend of King Alfred's, had at any rate access to the king's correspondence; for one chapter consists of prescriptions sent by Helias, Patriarch of Jerusalem, to the king. We learn the names of the first owner and scribe from lines in Latin verse at the end of the second part of the MS.

"Bald is the owner of this book, which he ordered Cild to write, Earnestly I pray here all men, in the name of Christ, That no treacherous person take this book from me, Neither by force nor by theft nor by any false statement. Why? Because the richest treasure is not so dear to me As my dear books which the Grace of Christ attends."

The book consists of 109 leaves and is written in a large, bold hand and one or two of the initial letters are very faintly illuminated. The writing is an exceptionally fine specimen of Saxon penmanship. On many of the pages there are mysterious marks, but it is impossible to conjecture their meaning. It has been suggested that they point to the sources from which the book was compiled and were inserted by the original owner.

To the student of folk lore and folk custom these sources of herb lore are of remarkable interest for the light they throw on the beliefs and customs of humble everyday people in Anglo-Saxon times. Of kings and warriors, of bards and of great ladies we can read in other Saxon literature, and all so vividly that we see their halls, the long hearths on which the fires were piled, the openings in the roof through which the smoke passed. We see the men with their "byrnies" of ring mail, their crested helmets, their leather-covered shields and deadly short swords. We see them and their womenkind wearing golden ornaments at their feasts, the tables laden with boars' flesh and venison and chased cups of ale and mead. We see these same halls at night with the men sleeping, their "byrnies" and helmets hanging near them, and in the dim light we can make out also the trophies of the chase hanging on the walls. We read of their mighty deeds, and we know at least something of the ideals and the thoughts of their great men and heroes. But what of that vast number of the human kind who were always in the background? What of the hewers of wood and drawers of water, the swineherds, the shepherds, the carpenters, the hedgers and cobblers? Is it not wonderful to think that in these manuscripts we can learn, at least to some extent, what plant life meant to these everyday folk? And even in these days to understand what plant life means to the true countryman is to get into very close touch with him. Not only has suburban life separated the great concentrated masses of our people from their birthright of meadows, fields and woods; of Nature, in her untamed splendour and mystery, most of them have never had so much as a momentary glimpse. But in Saxon times even the towns were not far from the unreclaimed marshes and forests, and to the peasant in those days they were full not only of seen, but also of unseen perils. There was probably not a Saxon child who did not know something of the awe of waste places and impenetrable forests. Even the hamlets lay on the very edge of forests and moors, and to the peasant these were haunted by giant, elf and monster, as in the more inaccessible parts of these islands they are haunted still to those who retain something of primitive imagination. And when we study the plant lore of these people we realise that prince and peasant alike used the simple but mysterious herbs not only to cure them of both physical and mental ills, but to guard them from these unseen monsters. Of the reverence they paid to herbs we begin to have some dim apprehension when we read of the ceremonies connected with the picking and administering of them.

"I have wreathed round the wounds The best of healing wreaths That the baneful sores may Neither burn nor burst, Nor find their way further, Nor turn foul and fallow. Nor thump and throle on, Nor be wicked wounds, Nor dig deeply down; But he himself may hold In a way to health. Let it ache thee no more Than ear in Earth acheth.

This was for one "in the water elf disease," and we read that a person so afflicted would have livid nails and tearful eyes, and would look downwards. Amongst the herbs to be administered when the charm was sung over him were a yew-berry, lupin, helenium, marsh mallow, dock elder, wormwood and strawberry leaves.

Goblins and nightmare were regarded as at least akin to elves, and we find the same herbs were to be used against them, betony being of peculiar efficacy against "monstrous nocturnal visions and against frightful visions and dreams." The malicious elves did not confine their attacks to human beings; references to elf-shot cattle are numerous. I quote the following from the chapter "against elf disease."

"For that ilk .

The instructions for a horse or cattle that are elf-shot runs thus:--

Another prescription for an elf-shot horse runs thus:--

"If a horse be elf-shot, then take the knife of which the haft is the horn of a fallow ox and on which are three brass nails, then write upon the horse's forehead Christ's mark and on each of the limbs which thou mayst feel at: then take the left ear, prick a hole in it in silence, this thou shalt do; then strike the horse on the back, then will it be whole.--And write upon the handle of the knife these words--

"Benedicite omnia opera Domini dominum.

"These nine attack against nine venoms. A worm came creeping, he tore asunder a man. Then took Woden nine magic twigs, then smote the serpent that he in nine dispersed. Now these nine herbs have power against nine magic outcasts against nine venoms & against nine flying things against the loathed things that over land rove. Against the red venoms against the runlan venom against the white venom against the blue venom against the yellow venom against the green venom against the dusky venom against the brown venom against the purple venom. Against worm blast against water blast against thorn blast against thistle blast Against ice blast Against venom blast . . . . . . . if any venom come flying from east or any come from north or any from west over mankind I alone know a running river and the nine serpents behold All weeds must now to herbs give way, Seas dissolve all salt water when I this venom from thee blow."

"A salve for flying venom. Take a handful of hammer wort and a handful of maythe and a handful of waybroad and roots of water dock, seek those which will float, and one eggshell full of clean honey, then take clean butter, let him who will help to work up the salve melt it thrice: let one sing a mass over the worts, before they are put together and the salve is wrought up."

"The Marshes created the Worm, Came the Worm and wept before Shamash, What wilt thou give me for my food? What wilt thou give me to devour? . . . . . . . Let me drink among the teeth And set me on the gums, That I may devour the blood of the teeth And of the gums destroy their strength. Then shall I hold the bolt of the door. . . . . . . . So must thou say this, O Worm, May Ea smite thee with the might of his fist."

Of periwinkle we read:--

In the treatment of disease we find that the material remedies, by which I mean remedies devoid of any mystic meaning, are with few exceptions entirely herbal. The herb drinks were made up with ale, milk or vinegar, many of the potions were made of herbs mixed with honey, and ointments were made of herbs worked up with butter. The most scientific prescription is that for a vapour bath, and there are suggestions for what may become fashionable once more--herb baths. The majority of the prescriptions are for common ailments, and one cannot help being struck by the number there are for broken heads, bleeding noses and bites of mad dogs. However ignorant one may be of medicine, it is impossible to read these old prescriptions without realising that our ancestors were an uncommonly hardy race, for the majority of the remedies would kill any of us modern weaklings, even if in robust health when they were administered. At times one cannot help wondering whether in those days, as not infrequently happens now, the bulletin was issued that "the operation was quite successful, but the patient died of shock!" And, as further evidence of the old truth that there is nothing new under the sun, it is pleasant to find that doctors, even in Saxon days, prescribed "carriage exercise," and moreover endeavoured to sweeten it by allowing the patient to "lap up honey" first. This prescription runs thus:--

The two prescriptions for hair which is too thick are in the same chapter:--

"In order that the hair may not wax, take emmets' eggs, rub them up, smudge on the place, never will any hair come up there." Again: "if hair be too thick, take a swallow, burn it to ashes under a tile and have the ashes shed on."

There are more provisions against diseases of the eye than against any other complaint, and it is probably because of the prevalence of these in olden days that we still have so many of the superstitions connected with springs of water. Both maythen and wild lettuce were used for the eyes. In the following for mistiness of eyes there is a touch of pathos:--

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