"Natural Healing with Herbs for a Healthier You"
THE BENEFITS OF THE USE OF GARLIC
IN HERBAL PREPARATIONS
HISTORY OF GARLIC
IN HERBAL PREPARATIONS
HISTORY OF GARLIC
The common garlic, a member of the same group of plants as the onion, is of such antiquity as a cultivated plant, that it is difficult with any certainty to trace the country of its origin. De Candolle, in his treatise on the “Origin of Cultivated Plants,” considered that is was apparently indigenous to the southwest of Siberia, whence it spread to southern Europe, where it has become naturalized, and cultivated in the Latin countries bordering on the Mediterranean. 1
According to Jethro Kloss’ tome “Back to Eden,” for nearly as long as there has been a written record of history, garlic has been mentioned as a food. It probably originated in central Asia, but now is cultivated in many countries and grows wild in Italy and southern Europe.
During the time of the Pharaohs, when Egypt was at the peak of its power, garlic was given to the laborers and slaves who were building the great pyramids in order to increase their stamina and strength as well as to protect them from disease. In the fifth century, A.D., the Greek historian Herodotus wrote that on an Egyptian pyramid there are inscriptions in Egyptian characters describing the amount of garlic, onions and radishes consumed by the workers and slaves who were building the great pyramid of King Khufu (Cheops).
The Ebers Papyrus, an Egyptian medical papyrus dated sometime around 1500 B.C., mentions garlic 22 times as a remedy for a variety of diseases. Hippocrates, Aristotle and Aristophanes all mentioned the importance of the use of garlic. The Bible clearly states that for 400 years, (probably around 1730 to 1330 B.C.) while the Israelites were slaves in Egypt and no doubt being forced to help build some of the pyramids, garlic as well as some of the other herbs in the same family, was part of their diet.
Garlic is mentioned in the literature of all of the great ancient world kingdoms; Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece and Rome. The great Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder recommended garlic in his “Histoia Naturatis.” Garlic was probably introduced into Japan from Korea along with Buddhism in about 30 B.C. Discordies, the chief medical officer in the Roman army in the first century A.D., used garlic to treat intestinal worms. 2
Today, garlic is grown literally all over the world and though primarily used as a food source, garlic is making a strong comeback as a potent, natural, herbal remedy.
Garlic was placed by the ancient Greeks (Theophrastus relates) on the piles of stones at Crossroads as a supper for Hecate, and according to Pliny, garlic and onion were invocated as deities by the Egyptians at the taking of oaths.
It was largely consumed by the ancient Greeks and Romans, as we may read in Virgil’s “Eclogues.” Orace, however, records his detestation of garlic, the smell of which, even in his days (as much later in Shakespeare’s time), was accounted a sign of vulgarity. He calls it “more poisonous that hemlock,” and relates how he was made ill by eating it at the table of Maecenas. Among the ancient Greeks, persons who partook of it were not allowed to enter the temples of Cybele. Homer, however, tells us that it was to the virtues of the “Yellow Garlic” that Ulysses owed his escape from being changed by Circe into a pig, like each of his companions.
Homer also makes garlic part of the entertainment, which Nestor served up to his guest Machaon. There is a Mohommedan legend that “when Satan stepped out from the Garden of Eden after the fall of man, Garlic sprang up from the spot where he placed his left foot, and Onion from that where his right foot touched.”
There is a curious superstition in some parts of Europe that if a morsel of bulb be chewed by a man running a race, it will prevent his competitors from getting ahead of him, and Hungarian jockeys will sometimes fasten a clove of garlic to the bits of their horses in the belief that any other racers running close to those thus baited, will fall back the instant they smell the offensive odor.
Many of the old writers praise garlic as a medicine, though others, including Gerard, are skeptical as to its powers. Pliny gives an exceedingly long list of complaints, in which it was considered beneficial, and Galen eulogizes it as the rustic’s “Theriag” or Heal All. One of its older popular names in this country was “Poor Man’s Treacle,” meaning theriac, in which sense we find it in Chaucer and many old writers.
The name garlic is of Anglo-Saxon origin, being derived from gar (a spear) and lac, (a plant), in reference to the shape of its leaves. 3
According to Jethro Kloss’ tome “Back to Eden,” for nearly as long as there has been a written record of history, garlic has been mentioned as a food. It probably originated in central Asia, but now is cultivated in many countries and grows wild in Italy and southern Europe.
During the time of the Pharaohs, when Egypt was at the peak of its power, garlic was given to the laborers and slaves who were building the great pyramids in order to increase their stamina and strength as well as to protect them from disease. In the fifth century, A.D., the Greek historian Herodotus wrote that on an Egyptian pyramid there are inscriptions in Egyptian characters describing the amount of garlic, onions and radishes consumed by the workers and slaves who were building the great pyramid of King Khufu (Cheops).
The Ebers Papyrus, an Egyptian medical papyrus dated sometime around 1500 B.C., mentions garlic 22 times as a remedy for a variety of diseases. Hippocrates, Aristotle and Aristophanes all mentioned the importance of the use of garlic. The Bible clearly states that for 400 years, (probably around 1730 to 1330 B.C.) while the Israelites were slaves in Egypt and no doubt being forced to help build some of the pyramids, garlic as well as some of the other herbs in the same family, was part of their diet.
Garlic is mentioned in the literature of all of the great ancient world kingdoms; Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece and Rome. The great Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder recommended garlic in his “Histoia Naturatis.” Garlic was probably introduced into Japan from Korea along with Buddhism in about 30 B.C. Discordies, the chief medical officer in the Roman army in the first century A.D., used garlic to treat intestinal worms. 2
Today, garlic is grown literally all over the world and though primarily used as a food source, garlic is making a strong comeback as a potent, natural, herbal remedy.
Garlic was placed by the ancient Greeks (Theophrastus relates) on the piles of stones at Crossroads as a supper for Hecate, and according to Pliny, garlic and onion were invocated as deities by the Egyptians at the taking of oaths.
It was largely consumed by the ancient Greeks and Romans, as we may read in Virgil’s “Eclogues.” Orace, however, records his detestation of garlic, the smell of which, even in his days (as much later in Shakespeare’s time), was accounted a sign of vulgarity. He calls it “more poisonous that hemlock,” and relates how he was made ill by eating it at the table of Maecenas. Among the ancient Greeks, persons who partook of it were not allowed to enter the temples of Cybele. Homer, however, tells us that it was to the virtues of the “Yellow Garlic” that Ulysses owed his escape from being changed by Circe into a pig, like each of his companions.
Homer also makes garlic part of the entertainment, which Nestor served up to his guest Machaon. There is a Mohommedan legend that “when Satan stepped out from the Garden of Eden after the fall of man, Garlic sprang up from the spot where he placed his left foot, and Onion from that where his right foot touched.”
There is a curious superstition in some parts of Europe that if a morsel of bulb be chewed by a man running a race, it will prevent his competitors from getting ahead of him, and Hungarian jockeys will sometimes fasten a clove of garlic to the bits of their horses in the belief that any other racers running close to those thus baited, will fall back the instant they smell the offensive odor.
Many of the old writers praise garlic as a medicine, though others, including Gerard, are skeptical as to its powers. Pliny gives an exceedingly long list of complaints, in which it was considered beneficial, and Galen eulogizes it as the rustic’s “Theriag” or Heal All. One of its older popular names in this country was “Poor Man’s Treacle,” meaning theriac, in which sense we find it in Chaucer and many old writers.
The name garlic is of Anglo-Saxon origin, being derived from gar (a spear) and lac, (a plant), in reference to the shape of its leaves. 3
GARLIC
by Gwen M. Porritt
by Gwen M. Porritt