spasmodic properties which are helpful in cases of hysteria, epilepsy and St
Vitus’ dance appear in the learned medical literature from the time of John
Ray onwards, but evidence that this was also (and maybe originally) a folk
remedy seems to be limited to the Highlands^150 and to one nineteenth-cen-
tury author’s sweeping assertion that ‘the belief in their good effect in such
cases is certainly very widely spread among the peasantry’^151 (of Great Brit-
ain, by implication). Had that been true, more records would surely have
been picked up by folk collectors? As it is, the only other ones traced have
been for other purposes: in the Highlands^152 to allay fevers and in Glouces-
tershire^153 to ease persistent headaches.
Erophila verna (Linnaeus) de Candolle, in the broad sense
Draba verna Linnaeus
whitlowgrass
(Folk credentials questionable) The use ofErophila verna as a cure for whit-
lows in Essex^154 in the 1920s may well have been inspired by a reading of the
herbals. The lack of other and earlier records looks suspicious.
Cochlearia officinalis Linnaeus
north-western and central Europe; introduced into North America
Cochlearia anglica Linnaeus
scurvy-grass
north-western Europe
Asthe vernacular name scurvy-grass advertises,Cochleariawas valued, in
both folk and learned medicine, as an antiscorbuticpar excellence,being par-
ticularly rich, as we now know, in vitamin C. John Parkinson in his 1640 herbal
said the kind he knew as ‘Dutch Scurvey-grass’, i.e.C. anglica,was the more
effective and the more frequently used for this purpose than the saltier ‘Eng-
lish Scurvy-grass’, i.e.C. officinalis.^155 That was a distinction probably too sub-
tle, however, to have arisen within the folk tradition; such folk records as have
been found of the use of these plants for scurvy all come in any case from the
far north and west of the British Isles, whereC. officinalispredominates. That
the herb was also once valued for this purpose in the Faeroe Islands^156 suggests
that its popularity in their neighbour, the Shetlands,^157 as a cure for skin com-
plaints was an extension of use for scorbutic sores more specifically. The cus-
tom inKent^158 of taking a daily draught of the drink in spring, as a means of
cleansing the system, was clearly part of the same family of uses.
When Martin Martin visited Skye in 1695, however, he noted this herb in
St John’s-worts to Primulas 119