CAN YOU IMAGINE A WORLD WITHOUT ANTIBIOTICS?

Hedge Woundwort

Soon we may not have to! As bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics it may not be long before we are forced to treat illness and injury without their help. But, of course, this is how it was through our history. Our forebears faced the some challenge and found many ways to avoid sepsis.
Common wayside herbs or, as we disparagingly call them, weeds, were their medicine chest, their pharmacy. The héahlæcas, the Anglo-Saxon healers used herbs extensively. (The A-S word for plant was wyrt, so a healing herb was called a læcewyrt and an administer of the medicine was therefore a lácnestre.)
One such wyrt, or wort, is the common hedge nettle (Stachys sylvatica). It has many names but some, hedge woundwort, all-heal (or heal-all), offer clues to its usage – and importance.

While the orchid-like flowers are attractive – especially to bees and other pollinators – it is the leaves that were used. They were harvested and made into poultices. Applied to a wound, the sap would inhibit infection. The plant’s morphology even hints to its properties as the heart-shaped leaves blush blood red as they age.

There are many other plants we banish from our gardens that have similar properties, again the old names attest to their efficacy, self-heal (Prunella vulgaris) knit-bone, another name for comfrey (Symphytum officinale), or feverfew (Tanacetum parthenium), to name one or three. Other common plants have country names that are perhaps more ‘earthy'; dandelion (Taraxacum) is all called ‘Jack-piss-the-bed’, or more succinctly ‘Pissy-bed’, as it was used to make a diuretic.
Perhaps it is time to avail ourselves of the herb-lore and return once more to, quite literally, common or garden remedies.