Been seeing Boneset blooming when I walk. Boneset and the killer weed—Snakeroot look alike. Boneset is also called Joe Pye weed. Joe Pye was an Indian medicine man in New England who cured typhus using Eupatorium perfoliatum, boneset. It relieved symptoms of break-bone (dengue) fever.
Boneset was introduced by Indians to American culture as a remedy for fever. They used it to induce sweating in order to break fevers. Supposedly they often fought fever which caused a deep muscular ache so intense that it made one feel as if their bones were breaking - thus the name, boneset - as it rid the body of the fever, the bones no longer ached. However, the history would seem to go farther back than our native Americans. There are reports of the plant also being used as far away as Asia Minor as long ago as 100-ish BC. Mithridates Eupator was the king of Pontus in Asia Minor from 120 to 63 BCE. He had to flee a murderous mother, supposedly, as heir to the throne and in his exile to the wilderness, he purposefully consumed small amounts of poisonous plants to build up his immunity. One of the plants he was supposed to have ingested was from the genus that now bears his name, Eupatorium, of which common boneset is but one of 200 species. He likely ate some White Snakeroot too. It is extremely toxic and has the notoriety of having killed Abe Lincoln’s mother via the milk she drank from cows who’d eaten it.
Astrid loves her dogs. Blu is from her Corgi Phoebe and Larry’s Phinnie. Yesterday was her 6th birthday. Astrid fixed special doggie cake and they celebrated.
2 comments:
What a cute basket of puppies, how wonderful that Blu gets a treat to celebrate!
What an amazing history read. I think that doggie hopes there's more medicinal herbs in the cake! Those eyes! Linda in Kansas
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