HERBS WHATZAT?

## IN THIS ARTICLE I INTEND TO EXPLAIN THE EVOLUTION OF THE TERM 'HERB' from the beginning to what it includes now.

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**IN THE BEGINNING**

For Western Herbalism, The Beginning is from the Holy Bible Book of Beginnings, The first book called GENESIS. In explaining to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, The Creator describes what is an Herb.

*Genesis 1:29-30*

*29**And God said [to Adam], Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. [Food]*

*30**And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat [Food]: and it was so.*

So followers of the Bible considered an Herb to be an Annual Plant with a soft edible stalk that bore flowers and produced seeds. The roots of such plants were not included since the Creator had not mentioned roots being fior food.

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**INTERPRETATION**

In general use, **herbs** are plants with savory or aromatic properties that are used for flavoring and garnishing food, in medicine, or as fragrances. Culinary use typically distinguishes *herbs* from spices. ***Herbs* refer to the leafy green or flowering parts of a plant (either fresh or dried)**, while *spices* are usually dried and produced from other parts of the plant, including seeds, bark, roots and fruits.

This Definition would stick with the Jews and later the Christian Church for thousands of years and is the 'Die-Hard' definition of Botanists and Herbalists today

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**HERBS WERE HERBS... SPICES WERE SPICES... THEN THEY WEREN'T (Oh My)**

The Earliest HERBALS contained a list of plants which met the above definition. In the Middle Ages the Spice Trade was flourishing like a weed in its own right. Marco Polo had not yet reached China, so at first most Spices came from the area around The Holy Land and western Mediterranean. Traders bought spices in large city markets and some of them came from as far as India and Africa. They were carried back to as far as the British Isles where they were prized first for seasoning food and later for medicine. They were still separate as Herbs or as Spices. How they became part of HERBALS is again the result of the Church.

At that time the practice of medicine was mostly by the Church and Monks in Monasteries which doubled as Hospitals. Some Spices were already mentioned in the Bible and other Animal products like Honey and so Monks added them to their medical arsenal. Secular doctors and Barber Surgeons followed what the Monks and Nuns did. The list of spices as medicines kept getting longer. Herbs and medicinal plants were given religious labels like "Saint John's Wort" The actual common name "St John's wort" comes from its traditional flowering and harvesting on St John's Day, 24 June.

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**HOW VEGETABLES BECAME HERBS (Oh Bother)**

As late as 1935 **Mrs Maud Grieve** published **'A Modern Herbal'** which contained traditional herbs and a few of the now accepted medicinal spices in that new two volume Herbal. She and other Herbalists in England had produced many medicines used to treat wounded soldiers from the trenches of WW I to good effect. NOW in the 1935 edition she includes many Vegetables and some Roots like Onion and Carrot in her Herbal because of their medicinal properties. Still some like Garden Cabbage are not included (Oh Bother)

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**THROW EVERYTHING IN THE BOOK (Well Almost)**

Originally, a **herbal** was a book containing the names and descriptions of plants, usually with information on their medicinal, tonic, culinary, toxic, hallucinatory, aromatic, or magical powers, and the legends associated with them. A herbal may also classify the plants it describes, may give recipes for herbal extracts, tinctures, or potions, and sometimes include mineral and animal medicaments *(like Honey, Butter or Lard)* in addition to those obtained from plants. Herbals were often illustrated to assist plant identification.

**TODAY a Herbal is almost exclusively a medical book of herbs** listed in a section of 'Materia Medica' followed by a sort of repertory with how to prepare and administer them as remedies for a list of diseases. The Complete Medicinal Herbal by Penelope Ody (c) 1993, lists more than 250 remedies for most common ailments.

Most Medicinal Herbalists accept all plants with medicinal properties including Herbs, Roots, Vines, Berries Trees, Fruit, Nuts and Bark

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**WHICH LABEL IS THE RIGHT ONE?**

Today, traditional Herbalists still stick with this definition:

In general use, **herbs** are plants with savory or aromatic properties that are used for flavoring and garnishing food, in medicine, or as fragrances. Culinary use typically distinguishes *herbs* from spices. ***Herbs* refer to the leafy green or flowering parts of a plant (either fresh or dried)**, while *spices* are usually dried and produced from other parts of the plant, including seeds, bark, roots and fruits.

The more modern the HERBAL, the more you are likely to find something included; but even tho it is in a HERBAL, that does not define it as a Herb. It is included for its Medicinal Value.