Of Thyme and Thumos

https://southernappalachianherbs.blogspot.com/2022/01/of-thyme-and-thumos.html



Thyme is an herb that some people describe as being somewhat bitter in flavor, but I would describe it as more savory.  Really, the flavor is difficult to describe.  It falls into that “umami” category like mushrooms, fermented sauces or browned meat, but with a decidedly herbal flavor and aroma.  Thyme enhances the flavors of meats, fish, onions, etc.  Medicinally though, it is a very powerful and too often overlooked herb.  In the era of COVID and the flu season, Thyme is an essential herb for coughs, bronchial congestions and respiratory colds to have in your apothecary or herbal medicine cabinet.  Thyme is one of the most used and written of herbs in all of recorded history.


Thyme was noted as an antiseptic herb as long ago as 3,000 BC in ancient Sumeria.  It was used in ancient Egypt in embalming.  Theophrastus wrote of Thyme as a bee plant that ancient Greek beekeepers grew for honey.  Pliny the Edler wrote of Thyme’s ability to repel venomous creatures.  Virgil wrote poems about the scent of Thyme.  Most tellingly, Dioscórides wrote of Thyme under the name, “Thumos”.  Thumos, as you may remember from reading the Odyssey and the Iliad in high school (which, hopefully, students still do) was a word the ancient Greeks used to describe spiritedness - forcefulness, courage, manliness, passion, battle furor, etc.  Great men were men of Thumos.  He wrote in de Materia Medica:


Everyone knows thyme. It is a little shrub full of branches surrounded with many narrow little leaves, and little heads with flowers resembling purple on the top. It grows chiefly in rocky and barren places. Taken as a drink with salt and vinegar it is able to drive out phlegmy matter through the bowels. A decoction with honey helps orthopnoea [form of asthma] and the asthmatic, expels worms and the menstrual flow, is an abortifacient, expels the afterbirth, and is urinary. Mixed with honey and taken as a linctus [syrup] it makes matter come up [vomitory]. Applied with vinegar it dissolves new swellings and clots of blood, and takes away thymos [hormonal glandular enlargement] and hanging warts. Applied with wine and polenta it is good for hip pains. Eaten with meat it is good for poor vision. It is good instead of sauce for use in health. It is also called white thyme, cephalotus, epithumis, or thyrsium; the Romans call it thymus, the Egyptians, stephane, and the Dacians, mozula.


Dioscorides mentions several varieties of Thyme under their own headings, including the Wild Thyme and mother of Thyme, making the Thyme family among the most recommended of herbs in his massive herbal.  The term, Thumos, makes a great deal of sense when you consider the ability of Thyme to bring breath and energy into asthmatic or congested lungs.  He also included recipes for Thyme vinegar and Thyme wine:


The ancients used thymoxalme for those with a weak stomach (mixing three or four cups with warm water) as well as for arthritis and those inflated with wind. It extracts thick black fluids, and it is made as follows. Take an acetabulum [vinegar cruet] of thyme pounded into small pieces, an equal amount of salt, and a little each of polenta, rue and pulegium; throw them into a jar, pour on them three pints of water and a quarter pint of vinegar, wrap it in a linen cloth, and set it in the open air.


Bind one hundred ounces of pounded sifted thyme in a linen cloth, put it into nine gallons of must for three months, and then jar it. It is good for digestive difficulties, lack of appetite, dysentery, disorders of the nerves, and hypochondria [nervous gastric disorder]; for winter shiverings, and for poison from venomous creatures [bites] that chill and putrify.


Should I ever have 100 ounces of Thyme on hand to add to 9 gallons of fermenting wine… I might try that one!  He wrote separately of Wild Thyme or Mother of Thyme:


Thymbra is also well known. It grows in barren and rough places — similar to thyme, only smaller and more tender, and bearing a stalk full of flowers of a greenish colour. It can do the same things as thyme (taken the same way) and it is suitable for use in health. There is also a cultivated satureia, of less value in everything than the wild, yet more effective for meat [sauce] because it does not have as much sharpness.



In the Monastic Medicine of the Middle Ages, Thyme was much used as a medicinal herb.  Saint Hildegard von Bingen recommended wild thyme to be eaten frequently for skin issues and to clarify thought.   Thyme, she says, carries off putrid matter from the head. Eternally, she recommends it for leprosy. She recommends an ointment made of thyme, sage and tithymol for palsy and stitch.  Continuing in this tradition, Brother Aloysius recommended Thyme for stubborn cough, whooping cough, anemia, worms, excessive gall and bladder complaints, to clear the lungs migraine, dizziness and as a depurative.  The use of Thyme continued into German and French Folk medicine, as evidenced by its frequent recommendation in formulas by Maria Treben and Maurice Messegue.


Gerard lists six varieties of Thyme in his herba, and lists the virtues of Thyme as:


A. It bringeth down the desired sickness, provoketh urine, applied in baths and fomentations it procureth sweat: being boiled in wine, it helpeth the ague, it easeth the strangury, it stayeth the hicket, it breaketh the stones in the bladder, it helpeth the lethargy, frenzy, and madness, and stayeth the vomiting of blood.


B. Wild Thyme boiled in wine and drunk, is good against the wambling and gripings of the belly, ruptures, convulsions, and inflammations of the liver.


C. It helpeth against the bitings of any venomous beast, either taken in drink, or outwardly applied.


D. Aetius writeth, That Serpillum infused well in vinegar, and then sodden and mingled with rose water, is a right singular remedy to cure them that have had a long frenzy or lethargy.


E. Galen prescribeth one dram of the juice to be given in vinegar against the vomiting of blood, and helpeth such as are grieved with the spleen.


Culpepper write of Garden Thyme and Wild Thyme separately:


COMMON GARDEN THYME

Government and virtues. It is a noble strengthener of the lungs, as notable a one as grows; neither is there scarce a better remedy growing for that disease in children which they commonly call the chin- cough, than it is. It purges the body of phlegm, and is an excellent remedy for shortness of breath. It kills worms in the belly, and being a notable herb of Venus, provokes the terms, gives safe and speedy delivery to women in travail, and brings away the after birth. It is so harmless you need not fear the use of it. An ointment made of it takes away hot swellings and warts, helps the sciatica and dullness of sight, and takes away pains and hardness of the spleen. Tis excellent for those that are troubled with the gout.It eases pains in the loins and hips. The herb taken any way inwardly, comforts the stomach much, and expels wind.


WILD, OR MOTHER OF THYME

Government and virtues. The whole plant is fragrant, and yields an essential oil that is very heating. An infusino of the leaves removes the head-ach, occasioned by the debauch of the preceding night.


Mother of Thyme is under Venus. It is excellent in nervous disorders. A strong infusion of it, drank in the manner of tea, is pleasant, and a very effectual remedy for head-achs, giddiness, and other disorders of that kind; and it is a certain remedy for that troublesome complaint, the night-mare. A gentleman afflicted for a long space of time with this complaint in a terrible manner, and having in vain sought for relief from the usual means employed for that purpose, was advised to make trial of the infusion of this plant, which soon removed it, and he continued free for several years, after which the disorder sometimes returned, but always gave way to the remedy.


Maude Grieve gives us much history of Thyme and its use up to 1930 or so:


The Garden Thyme is an 'improved' cultivated form of the Wild Thyme of the mountains of Spain and other European countries bordering on the Mediterranean, flourishing also in Asia Minor, Algeria and Tunis, and is a near relation to our own Wild Thyme (Thymus serpyllum), which has broader leaves (the margins not reflexed as in the Garden Thyme) and a weaker odour.


It is cultivated now in most countries with temperate climates, though we do not know at what period it was first introduced into northern countries. It was certainly commonly cultivated in England before the middle of the sixteenth century, and is figured and described by Gerard.

The name Thyme, in its Greek form, was first given to the plant by the Greeks as a derivative of a word which meant 'to fumigate,' either because they used it as incense, for its balsamic odour, or because it was taken as a type of all sweet-smelling herbs. Others derive the name from the Greek word thumus, signifying courage, the plant being held in ancient and mediaeval days to be a great source of invigoration, its cordial qualities inspiring courage. The antiseptic properties of Thyme were fully recognized in classic times, there being a reference in Virgil's Georgics to its use as a fumigator, and Pliny tells us that, when burnt, it puts to flight all venomous creatures. Lady Northcote (in The Herb Garden) says that among the Greeks, Thyme denoted graceful elegance; 'to smell of Thyme' was an expression of praise, applied to those whose style was admirable. It was an emblem of activity, bravery and energy, and in the days of chivalry it was the custom for ladies to embroider a bee hovering over a sprig of Thyme on the scarves they presented to their knights. In the south of France, Wild Thyme is a symbol of extreme Republicanism, tufts of it being sent with the summons to a Republican meeting.


This little plant, so familiar also in its wild form, has never been known in England by any familiar name, though occasionally 'Thyme' is qualified in some way, such as 'Running Thyme,' or 'Mother-of-Thyme.' 'Mother Thyme' was probably derived from the use of the plant in uterine disorders, in the same way that 'Motherwort' (Leonurus Cardiaca) has received its popular name for use in domestic medicine.


The affection of bees for Thyme is well known and the fine flavour of the honey of Mount Hymettus near Athens was said to be due to the Wild Thyme with which it was covered (probably T. vulgaris), the honey from this spot being of such especial flavour and sweetness that in the minds and writings of the Ancients, sweetness and Thyme were indissolubly united. 'Thyme, for the time it lasteth, yieldeth most and best honie and therefor in old time was accounted chief,' says an old English writer. Large clumps of either Garden or Wild Thyme may with advantage be grown in the garden about 10 feet away from the hives.


Though apparently not in general use as a culinary herb among the ancients, it was employed by the Romans to give an aromatic flavour to cheese (and also to liqueurs).


Medicinal Action and Uses---Antiseptic, antispasmodic, tonic and carminative.


The pounded herb, if given fresh, from 1 to 6 OZ. daily, mixed with syrup, has been employed with success as a safe cure for whooping cough. An infusion made from 1 OZ. of the dried herb to 1 pint of boiling water, sweetened with sugar or honey, is also used for the same purpose, as well as in cases of catarrh and sore throat, given in doses of 1 or more tablespoonsful, several times daily. The wild plant may be equally well used for this.


Thyme tea will arrest gastric fermentation. It is useful in cases of wind spasms and colic, and will assist in promoting perspiration at the commencement of a cold, and in fever and febrile complaints generally.


In herbal medicine, Thyme is generally used in combination with other remedies.


Fluid extract, 1/2 to 1 drachm. Oil, 1 to 10 drops.


Oil of Thyme is employed as a rubefacient and counter-irritant in rheumatism, etc.


Thyme enters into the formula for Herb Tobacco, and employed in this form is good for digestion, headache and drowsiness.


In Perfumery, Essence of Thyme is used for cosmetics and rice powder. It is also used for embalming corpses.


The dried flowers have been often used in the same way as lavender, to preserve linen from insects.


In this country, Thyme is principally in request for culinary requirements, for its use in flavouring stuffings, sauces, pickles, stews, soups, jugged hare, etc. The Spaniards infuse it in the pickle with which they preserve their olives.


All the different species of Thyme and Marjoram yield fragrant oils extensively used by manufacturing perfumers for scenting soaps. When dried and ground, they enter into the composition of sachet powders.


THYMOL, a most valuable crystalline phenol, is the basis of the fragrant volatile Essence of Sweet Thyme, and is obtainable from Carum copticum, Monarda punctata and various other plants, as well as from T. vulgaris, being present to the extent of from 20 to 60 per cent in the oils which yield it. ..


Thymol is a powerful antiseptic for both internal and external use; it is also employed as a deodorant and local anaesthetic. It is extensively used to medicate gauze and wool for surgical dressings. It resembles carbolic acid in its action, but is less irritant to wounds, while its germicidal action is greater. It is therefore preferable as a dressing and during recent years has been one of the most extensively used antiseptics.


For the modern use of Thyme, we will turn to Plants for A Future:


Common thyme has a very long history of folk use for a wide range of ailments. It is very rich in essential oils and these are the active ingredients responsible for most of the medicinal properties. In particular, thyme is valued for its antiseptic and antioxidant properties, it is an excellent tonic and is used in treating respiratory diseases and a variety of other ailments. The flowering tops are anthelmintic, strongly antiseptic, antispasmodic, carminative, deodorant, diaphoretic, disinfectant, expectorant, sedative and tonic. The plant is used internally in the treatment of dry coughs, whooping cough, bronchitis, bronchial catarrh, asthma, laryngitis, indigestion, gastritis and diarrhoea and enuresis in children. It should not be prescribed for pregnant women. Externally, it is used in the treatment of tonsillitis, gum diseases, rheumatism, arthritis and fungal infections. The plant can be used fresh at any time of the year, or it can be harvested as it comes into flower and either be distilled for the oil or dried for later use. Thyme has an antioxidant effect, thus regular use of this herb improves the health and longevity of individual body cells and therefore prolongs the life of the body. The essential oil is strongly antiseptic. The whole herb is used in the treatment of digestive disorders, sore throats, fevers etc. The essential oil is one of the most important oils used in aromatherapy. Its keyword is "Bacterial". It is used especially in cases of exhaustion, depression, upper respiratory tract infections, skin and scalp complaints etc. The oil can cause allergic reactions and irritation to the skin and mucous membranes.


Now, as either feel a bit of a cold coming on or am still suffering the effects of “long COVID”, I am going to employ the powers of Tyme.  On Sunday, I roasted a chicken seasoned with Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme, as is traditional.  Today I will simmer the bones and scraps of that chicken in water, with Garlic, Onions, more Thyme and Parsley, a Bay Leaf or two and a couple of Cloves, Turmeric, salt and Black Pepper.  (all words capitalized are medicinal).  I will also have a sip of the Thyme tincture I keep on hand for congestion and to clear my voice before my weekly podcast.  Without a doubt, a Thyme infused chicken soup is among the tastiest of cold remedies!  



Author: Judson Carroll.  Judson Carroll is an Herbalist from the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. His weekly articles may be read at http://southernappalachianherbs.blogspot.com/

His weekly podcast may be heard at: www.spreaker.com/show/southern-appalachian-herbs


He offers free, weekly herb classes: https://rumble.com/c/c-618325



His New Book is Christian Herbal Medicine, History and Practice



Read about his new book, Christian Medicine, History and Practice: https://southernappalachianherbs.blogspot.com/2022/01/christian-herbal-medicine-history-and.html

Available for purchase on Amazon: www.amazon.com/dp/B09P7RNCTB
His other works include:

Herbal Medicine for Preppers, Homesteaders and Permaculture People by Judson Carroll

You can read about and purchase Herbal Medicine for Preppers, Homesteaders and Permaculture People here: southernappalachianherbs.blogspot.com/2021/10/herbal-medicine-for-preppers.html

Also available on Amazon: Herbal Medicine for Preppers, Homesteaders and Permaculture People: Carroll, Judson: 9798491252923: Amazon.com: Books

Look Up: The Medicinal Trees of the American South, An Herbalist's Guide: https://southernappalachianherbs.blogspot.com/2021/06/paypal-safer-easier-way-to-pay-online.html

The Herbs and Weeds of Fr. Johannes Künzle: https://southernappalachianherbs.blogspot.com/2021/05/announcing-new-book-herbs-and-weeds-of.html





Disclaimer

The information on this site is not intended to diagnose or treat any disease or condition. Nothing on this site has been evaluated or approved by the FDA. I am not a doctor. The US government does not recognize the practice of herbal medicine and their is no governing body regulating herbalists. Therefore, I'm just a guy who studies herbs. I am not offering any advice. I won't even claim that anything I write is accurate or true! I can tell you what herbs have "traditionally been used for." I can tell you my own experience and if I believe an herb helped me. I cannot, nor would I tell you to do the same. If you use any herb I, or anyone else, mentions you are treating yourself. You take full responsibility for your health. Humans are individuals and no two are identical. What works for me may not work for you. You may have an allergy, sensitivity or underlying condition that no one else shares and you don't even know about. Be careful with your health. By continuing to read my blog you agree to be responsible for yourself, do your own research, make your own choices and not to blame me for anything, ever.