Healing Herbs of the Upper Rio Grande: Traditional Medicine of the Southwest
Healing Herbs of the Upper Rio Grande: Traditional Medicine of the Southwest Customer Review: from the Medical Herbalism journal
Laura Curtin lived and worked among the curanderas and Native Americans of Northern New Mexico during the early part of the twentieth century. She fell in love with the plants and their lore, and later, at the prompting of a friend, decided to record them. Healing Herbs was first published in 1947, at a time when interest in traditional healing in Northern New Mexico was in decline. It helped preserve traditional information for a new generation — when editor Michael Moore arrived in Santa Fe in the 1960s he found copies of Curtin's book as a prized possession in many traditional households. The book is unique in the literature of ethnobotany in that it was written essentially by an insider in the tradition, rather than by an observer doing interviews.
Customer Review: Excellent guide to herbal uses of native Southwestern plants
Living in the Southwestern Chihuahuan desert, I am always on the search for sources of information regarding local flora and particularly ethnobotanical uses of plants. This is an excellent guide originally published in 1947 and edited by Michael Moore who I consider to be an expert on herbal uses of native southwestern plants. For anyone interested in this subject, a fabulous resource to have in your library!