Folklore ?

Hi BastLoki,

The Rosemary & Borage bits are right, so I guess the others are valid too

 

As Zig said, the Rosemary and the Borage bits are right, insofar as I've heard them before. Don't know about the other bits. Sage is meant to ward off evil spirits, so maybe that's what's meant there.

Incidentally, this bit isn't folklore, its supposedly fact (I can't vouch for it ), but apparently centuries ago, during the various battles of medieval times, the local womenfolk would gather both borage and yarrow in advance of an anticipated battle. A big pan of borage would be stewed immediately leading up to the battle, and all the soldiers would drink it. This gave them courage and strength for the battle.

Then when they were out scrapping, the women would brew the yarrow up instead. Anyone still walking would drink the yarrow tea, and anyone alive but not walking would have their wounds washed in the yarrow tea, as it was supposed to heal.

Centuries passed, and these little nuggets of wisdom became old wives tales, and mocked. The a few scientists decided to have a look at these claims. Guess what they found.

'Borage for courage' - Borage contains a chemical that is a mild stimulant, but primarily acts on the adrenal glands. So if you OD on it, then it is logical (to me at least) to assume that you'd end up full of adrenaline. We already know what adrenaline does to us, so I guess it makes sense that anything that increases your adrenaline level will make you temporarily tougher and braver.

Yarrow is claimed to be an antiseptic and astringent, so it makes sense that centuries ago, in the absence of modern medicines, they'd used yarrow to treat wounds.

 

Couldn't have put it better myself Dave

You need an astringent to stop the blood loss

 

mist around the moon rain is on its way

 

They took the bits that worked and turned it into "medicine"!

If I was in pain I'd rather have an infusion of morphine from a doctor than eating a poppy.

 

'They' being a very different they, choosing very different 'bits that worked' depending on the part of the world they're from.

I once had a fairly serious ailment that just wasn't going away using conventional treatment. It wasn't life threatening, but it was slowing me down quite a lot.

After a few months I decided to go to a Chinese herbalist. I was examined, and then I came away with lots of bags of unknown bits of dried roots, bark and leaves, with the instruction to stew it up and then drink the juice. I did so for a couple of weeks, each time going quite pleasantly light headed for half an hour after said drink. After two weeks, I was right as rain. I had an appointment with my normal GP, who was monitoring my progress. He was surprised that I was spot on. He asked how the new medication was going (the stuff he'd prescribed) and I said I don't know, I haven't taken it for a couple of weeks, I've been on the Chinese wood shavings instead. He played war with me, stating that some of the herbs used in Chinese medicine are quite poisonous. I didn't bother to answer back, but was thinking to myself, no different to 'normal' medicine then, if you exceed the dose you can quite easily make yourself very ill.

I should state at this point, I'm not suggesting for a second that herbal remedies should be used instead of whatever a proper qualified doctor prescribes. If I become ill, a normal GP is always my first choice. All has been and always will be. Just that on the one occasion I just described, conventional medicine didn't work for me, but a herbal remedy did.

 

You just got better. It happens.

Nothing wrong with eating loads of herbs and roots and stuff - it's good for you.

But until they can hold their own in large scale double blind trials, I'll stick to doctors and medicine when I'm ill rather than mystics and garden bits and pieces.

 

Ah, that explains it then

Months of virtually no improvement, doctors scratching their heads, referrals to specialists at the hospital, then when I'd had enough and tried an alternative remedy, by pure coincidence at the same time, after months of illness, I just got better

Of course it is possible that there was a placebo effect in action. It is also possible that me simply stopping the 'proper' medicine was the cause of my recovery. Whatever it was that actually did the trick, it happened after accepting alternative treatment. Maybe it was the wood shaving tea. Maybe it was mind over matter. Maybe the very same conventional medication that was supposed to be fixing me could have been causing a side effect that was making stay ill and so withdrawing it sorted the problem. Maybe it was a combination of several of these factors. In all honesty, I'm not too bothered about what actually did the trick, I'm just glad it did.

 

Done both, same end result, just one is more bitter.

 

I'm glad you got better, honestly.

But it's a mystery why these Herbalists and the like haven't secured multi billion pound patents for their remedies that are better than actual medicine.

Perhaps the "concoction not bloomin working in proper trials" thing holds them back.

Cures no. Nutrition and general wellbeing, no doubt.

 

There are loads of barriers to a new medicine being released. I'm not in any way an expert on the subject, but it seems to me that the hurdles are as follows:

1. Attitude. Scientists don't like to listen to ordinary folk. They'll sit in labs and offices studying things for years, and then announce a new theory that ordinary folk just know. For example, the ongoing debate about whether animals have emotions. A dog owner will tell you of course they do, in the science community it is still a matter of great debate. In medicine, it took a very long time for scientists to finally see if there really was something in Willow bark that relieved aches and pains, and eventually aspirin came into being.

2. Having got past the attitude barrier, next is the research and funding barrier. I wonder how that famous doctor (so famous I can't remember his name) explained that he needed more time and money to find out why the germs in his petri dish had gone mouldy and died, before penicillin came into being.

3. Next comes the trials. You can test stuff on worms, mice and dogs, but something has to be shown to be reasonably safe before it gets tested on humans. Then you have to find enough humans to test it on. Humans don't come cheap. Granted they are often students so will do it for beer money, but even beer money adds up. Then you have to wait a while after the tests to see if they turn green or grow extra limbs before you can progress.

4. Next comes licensing. I gather this takes time and money and lots of debating and decisions by committee.

At some point in there comes patent applications. This takes lots of time and money too, and of course nothing can be announced or formerly discovered until the patents are in place, otherwise every chemist lab in the world would be racing to get in their first.

 

Drug companies know exactly what these 'natural' remedies can and can't do, and if they work they make drugs - and therefore cash - out of them!

Anyway, ignore me. Alternative medicine is one of my pet peeves, and gets me uptight (ironically, I know of an all-natural herbal remedy for uptightness that is better than any conventional medicine!)

 

Too bright, too soon, rain before noon.

Oh and there's the cow standing up , sitting down one, but I can never remember whether its sitting down that brings rain or standing up:/