Herbal Medicine in Yemen

Abstract

Herbal Medicine in Yemen contains eleven studies on a wide range of virtually unrelated subjects. In their introduction, the editors mention that “religious and magical rituals are employed side by side with material medica” (p. 1) in Yemen. This should serve as warning for what is to come and send practitioners of phytotherapy into flight. They assert that Yemenites employ an enormous variety of plant-based medicines and allege that “[t]this is different in other Islamic countries, e.g. Morocco, where animal drugs are widely used” (p. 1). As an herbalist who has lived for extended periods in Morocco, who has also travelled widely therein and met many of its herbalists and healers, their latter assertion is not accurate. In all of the stalls and stores I visited in markets in cities nationwide, the only animal drugs I ever saw were small quantities of dried lizards and other such creatures; I found more animal drugs in the shops of sorcerers and witches who dabbled in the dark arts ...