Medieval medicine. Medieval “concoctions” were able to cure staphylococcus and styes
An informative and entertaining article by Emiliano Amici on some medieval remedies for common ailments.
You will be amazed at how shrewd and skilled they were at the time in the use of herbs and concoctions.
The post it can also be found on sguardosulmedioevo.org.
Medieval medicine
Staphylococcus aureus: a bacterium resistant to the most powerful antibiotics except… to a medieval remedy.
The magical mixture used to treat eye infections was garlic, onion, cow stomach bile and wine .
The particular and bizarre remedy was discovered by a group of researchers from the University of Nottingham translating a manuscript preserved in the British Library .
The "drug" is still very effective and was even presented at the annual congress of the Society for General Microbiology of Birmingham.
The manuscript in which the recipe was discovered is the Bald's Leechbook universally recognized as one of the very first medical texts.
The bizarre thing is that the ointment still works and this has caused a sensation even in the scientific community after the first surprising results on mice that have seen rapid recovery from both sty and staphylococcus.
Scientists have decided to recreate the potion called “Bald's Eye Drops "Noting an even more surprising thing:if we take the individual ingredients they have no benefit on the bacterium and other eye infections, but combined together we obtain amazing results, underlining the importance of the synergy between the ingredients and the fermentation of the same.
Obviously scholars are trying to understand "why" it works ... for now ... we are satisfied with the normal eye drops!
Once again, a serious blow to those who define the Middle Ages as a dark age! ( Article taken from:sguardosulmedioevo.org).