preview

Herbal Medicine : An Aspect Of The Medical Field

Good Essays

Herbal medicine is an aspect of the medical field that seems to have been overlooked in the past few decades, with the majority of focus on being western medicine. For thousands of years, indigenous peoples, and explorers alike counted on herbal remedies and medicines for treatment of wounds, personal hygiene, and curing sickness. The Aztec were a group that held a vast array of knowledge and skill in natural medicine, and even invested a great deal of energy into further researching herbal medicine. Unfortunately, Spanish friars destroyed all of the Aztec’s written records of botanical successes. After all, the priests considered the Aztecs’ as savage at the time. Even though there is much to be learned about Aztec natural medicine, there were many records kept by employees of the more enlightened members of the Spanish government. In this essay, the author will cover the few aspects known about Aztec medicine including the research they carried out in the name of Herbal medicine, a historical context behind medicinal practices among the Aztec, and also the plants and their uses. As stated previously, the Aztec invested a great deal of time, and resources into botanical research for medicinal purposes. The Huaxtepec garden, for example, devoted entirely to this purpose, had a seven-mile circumference. Montezuma 's gardens are described by Cervantes de Salazar in his1554 book entitled "Dialogues," and here we learn that there were some two thousand species of

Get Access