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 In this section:

•	What is Herbal Medicine
•	Where Did it Originate
•	What Can I Expect
•	Frequency & Cost
•	Gathering and Storing Herbs
•	Preparation Methods
•	*Herbs & Medicinal Trees*
•	Commonly Used Terms
•	Potentially Dangerous Herbs
•	Choosing a Practitioner
•	What Are the Benefits
•	Herbal Medicine as a Career
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•	Herbal Medicine Schools
•	Herbal Medicine Practitioners

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Herbal Medicine

Where Did Herbal Medicine Originate?

The roots of herbalism dates back thousands of years and formed the basis of medicine for various ancient cultures, playing a prominent role in Traditional Chinese Medicine and Ayurvedic Medicine.

Chinese herbalism dates back to 3,000 B.C. with the oldest know list of medicinal herbs published in what is considered to be China's first materia medica, called Pen Ts’ao (Divine Husbandsman). It is assume to be written by Shen Nung and includes 365 medicines derived from minerals, plants, and animals. In China, Huang Di, the legendary Yellow Emperor is credited with writing The Yellow Emperor’s classic of internal medicine (Huang Di Nei Jing), which lists 12 herbal prescriptions.

Ayurvedic herbalism in India incorporated a large number of herbal remedies, with the Indian Materia Medica, published in 1908 listing 2,982 medicinal plants. Greeks, Romans and Native Americans were also considered renowned herbalists. The physical evidence for herbalism goes back approximately 60,000 years to a Neanderthal burial site uncovered in 1960. The Egyptians were also renowned for the use of herbs, and official schools for herbalism existed in Egypt as early as 3,000 BC. The Ebers Papyrus, written around 1,500 B.C. and discovered in 1862, contains around 876 prescriptions made up of more than 500 different substances. Hippocrates mentions over 200 medicinal plants in his writings, some of which may have been passed down from Egyptian priest doctors. Dioscorides (c. 40-c. 90) and Galen (131-200 A.D.), both Greek surgeons, compiled herbal lists that remained the definitive materia medica texts for 1,500 years.

Native American shamans (medicine men) were also considered skillful at using native plants as medicines.

Throughout the Middle Ages, herbalism was preserved in the monasteries throughout Europe. Many of the earlier works of Hippocrates, Dioscorides, and Galen were translated by the monks whose gardens were filled with the most common and useful medicinal herbs.

Avicenna
Known as the “Prince of Physicians,” Iranian physician Avicenna (980-1037) combined the herbal traditions of Dioscorides and Galen with the ancient healthcare practices in Iran in his medical encyclopedia “The Canon of Medicine (al-Qanun fi at-tibb). Divided into five volumes, this encyclopedia includes medical knowledge collected from around the world, including Greece, Europe, India, Persia (Iran), China, and Tibet, to form standard principles of medicine. He also composed the Kitāb al-shifā (known as the "Book of Healing"), a vast philosophical and scientific encyclopedia.

Parcelsus
Herbalist Theophrastus Phillippus Aureolus Bombastus von Hohenheim, known as Paracelsus (1493-1541) popularized the 1st century “doctrine of signatures.” The doctrine of signatures refers to the fact that every herb has its own “sign” based on its appearance, color, scent, taste, and smell. This sign also indicated its medicinal use for various illnesses. Although some modern herbalists and flower essence practitioners refer to concepts within the Doctrine of Signatures, others reject the works as archaic.

Nicolas Culpeper
Considered a well-known figure in herbalism, Englishman Nicholas Culpeper (1616-1654) popularized the use of astrology as a component of herbalism. With astrological herbalism, each herb was associated with one of the twelve signs of the zodiac and a ruling planet. Herbs were prescribed based on which areas of the body these signs and planets ruled. Culpeper stated, “he that would know the reason of the operation of the Herbs, must look up as high as the stars.” He published The English Physician (1652) and The Complete Herbal (1653) which became extremely popular, and which discussed the holistic principles of medicine in relation to astrology and plant lore. These concents were considered rather radical for his time.

With the invention of the printing press in the mid-fifteenth century, herbal literature was mass-produced and made accessible to the general population. Using herbs for various conditions required no formal education or specialized skills, as the herbs could be simply gathered used in the recommended manner and dosage.

Despite the popularity of herbalism throughout the world, its popularity began to decline with the advent of modern pharmaceuticals, which could be mass produced and easily located and purchased.

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