1885 Cherokees - Use of Medicinal Plants

 

1590 North American Atlantic Coast Natives by John White (c1540 – c1593). 

The village of Pomeiooc (Pomeiock) was a Native America settlement,

 designated on de Bry’s map of Virginia, Americae Pars Nunc Virginia Dicta,

 between today’s Wyesocking Bay & Lake Landing, North Carolina. 

John White called the settlement Pomeyoo.

 Use of Medicinal Plants

There can be no doubt that in course of time a haphazard use of plants would naturally lead to the discovery that certain herbs are efficacious in certain combinations of symptoms. These plants would thus come into more frequent use & finally would obtain general recognition in the Indian materia medica. By such a process of evolution an empiric system of medicine has grown up among the Cherokees, by which they are able to treat some classes of ailments with some degree of success, although without any intelligent idea of the process involved. It must be remembered that our own medical system has its remote origin in the same mythic conception of disease, & that within two hundred years judicial courts have condemned women to be burned to death for producing sickness by spells & incantations, while even at the present day our faith-cure professors reap their richest harvest among people commonly supposed to belong to the intelligent classes. In the treatment of wounds the Cherokee doctors exhibit a considerable degree of skill, but as far as any internal ailment is concerned the average farmer’s wife is worth all the doctors in the whole tribe.

...The patient has much to do with his recovery, for the Indian has the same implicit confidence in the shaman that a child has in a more intelligent physician. The ceremonies & prayers are well calculated to inspire this feeling, & the effect thus produced upon the mind of the sick man undoubtedly reacts favorably upon his physical organization.

The following list of twenty plants used in Cherokee practice will give a better idea of the extent of their medical knowledge than [pg 324]could be conveyed by a lengthy dissertation. The names are given in the order in which they occur in the botanic notebook filled on the reservation, excluding names of food plants & species not identified, so that no attempt has been made to select in accordance with a preconceived theory. Following the name of each plant are given its uses as described by the Indian doctors, together with its properties as set forth in the United States Dispensatory, one of the leading pharmacopœias in use in this country. For the benefit of those not versed in medical phraseology it may be stated that aperient, cathartic, & deobstruent are terms applied to medicines intended to open or purge the bowels, a diuretic has the property of exciting the flow of urine, a diaphoretic excites perspiration, & a demulcent protects or soothes irritated tissues, while hæmoptysis denotes a peculiar variety of blood-spitting & aphthous is an adjective applied to ulcerations in the mouth.

James Mooney. The Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees.  Seventh Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1885-1886, US  Government Printing Office, Washington, 1891, pages 301-398

1885 Cherokees - CEREMONIES FOR GATHERING PLANTS AND PREPARING MEDICINE.

 

CEREMONIES FOR GATHERING PLANTS AND PREPARING MEDICINE.

There are a number of ceremonies & regulations observed in connection with the gathering of the herbs, roots, & barks, which can not be given in detail within the limits of this paper. In searching for his medicinal plants the shaman goes provided with a number of white & red beads, & approaches the plant from a certain direction, going round it from right to left one or four times, reciting certain prayers the while. He then pulls up the plant by the roots & drops one of the beads into the hole & covers it up with the loose earth. In one of the formulas for hunting ginseng the hunter addresses the mountain as the “Great Man” & assures it that he comes only to take a small piece of flesh (the ginseng) from its side, so that it seems probable that the bead is intended as a compensation to the earth for the plant thus torn from her bosom. In some cases the doctor must pass by the first three plants met until he comes to the fourth, which he takes & may then return for the others. The bark is always taken from the east side of the tree, & when the root or branch is used it must also be one which runs out toward the east, the reason given being that these have imbibed more medical potency from the rays of the sun.

When the roots, herbs, & barks which enter into the prescription have been thus gathered the doctor ties them up into a convenient package, which he takes to a running stream & casts into the water with appropriate prayers. Should the package float, as it generally does, he accepts the fact as an omen that his treatment will be successful. On the other hand, should it sink, he concludes that some part of the preceding ceremony has been improperly carried out & at once sets about procuring a new package, going over the whole performance from the beginning. Herb-gathering by moonlight, so important a feature in European folk medicine, seems to be no part of Cherokee ceremonial. There are fixed regulations in regard to the preparing of the decoction, the care of the medicine during the continuance of the treatment, & the disposal of what remains after the treatment is at an end. In the arrangement of details the shaman frequently employs the services of a lay assistant. In these degenerate days a number of upstart pretenders to the healing art have arisen in the tribe & endeavor to impose upon the ignorance of their fellows by posing as doctors, although knowing [pg 340]next to nothing of the prayers & ceremonies, without which there can be no virtue in the application. These impostors are sternly frowned down & regarded with the utmost contempt by the real professors, both men & women, who have been initiated into the sacred mysteries & proudly look upon themselves as conservators of the ancient ritual of the past.

James Mooney. The Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees.  Seventh Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1885-1886, US  Government Printing Office, Washington, 1891, pages 301-39