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Mysteries of Ancient Medicine - Season 1 Episode 7 - Abracadabra, Longmen Recipes, Belemnites
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00:02The Romans believed that magic could ward off deadly diseases.
00:09But could the cure for malaria really be as simple as abracadabra?
00:15These mysterious words are believed to contain incredible power,
00:20and might be the difference between life and death.
00:25Ancient medical prescriptions are etched into Chinese caves.
00:30But can researchers decipher the mysterious secrets that are hidden in stone?
00:38This is something completely unique.
00:40There's nothing else quite like it in China.
00:42Where do they come from, and who inscribed them?
00:49In medieval Poland, magical healing rites are performed by experienced wise women.
00:56But how does a fossilized squid fit into their practices?
01:00This fossil is found in the grave of an elderly woman.
01:03What is it doing there?
01:04Is it used ritually?
01:05Is it used medicinally?
01:06Is there even a difference?
01:08Anything that happens?
01:38legislatures
01:38& climax
01:39A 7th-century grave is unearthed from the Gothic Lausanne Cathedral.
01:46Inside the grave, researchers find a small 9-centimeter tall silver cross.
01:56Although the discovery of a cross in a Christian church is not itself remarkable, it is what
02:04is written on the cross that raises eyebrows.
02:07The words Abrax Abraka are etched into the silver.
02:15To the untrained eye, they might be sacred words significant to Christianity, but in
02:23fact they are not part of the Christian faith at all.
02:27They are indications of a very different set of beliefs.
02:33One of talismans, charms and magic words.
02:40Many researchers believe it is related to one magic word in particular, abracadabra.
02:54The word abracadabra known worldwide as this idea of this magician pulling a rabbit out
03:02of a hat.
03:03It has a sense of happiness associated to it.
03:05But, where did the word actually come from and what does it really mean?
03:12The word abracadabra is first written down 1800 years ago in the medical works of Roman writer
03:20Quintus Saranus Simonicus, who likely lived between the 2nd and 3rd centuries.
03:27So not too much is known about Quintus Saranus Simonicus.
03:30We know that he was a learned man of his age.
03:33And we know that he was a tutor to two boys, Gaeta and Caracalla, who would eventually go
03:38on to co-rule Rome.
03:41But it didn't last very long.
03:43In 2-11, Caracalla killed Gaeta and purged the kingdom of anybody who had anything to do
03:48with him, which included Saranus.
03:52Now, perhaps as a result of that purge, we actually don't know very much about him at
03:56all.
03:56But one of his manuscripts has survived, the Liber Medicinalis.
04:02Liber Medicinalis is a collection of 64 treatments, remedies, and recipes for a variety of ailments.
04:11Most of his recipes are borrowed from older texts, however, he did make some suggestions
04:17of his own.
04:18Saranus is adding some of his own flavor, including some magical spells, specifically
04:22in his cure for malaria.
04:25According to Saranus, to try and cure malaria, you have to create a magical talisman.
04:31So you start by taking a piece of parchment, writing the word abracadabra.
04:36Then you take a letter off and write abracadabra, and then abracadab.
04:42And you write it again and again and again, taking a letter off each time to end up with just
04:46an A. So you have this inverted triangle.
04:49You roll that up.
04:51You wrap it around your neck in some linen.
04:56You wear it for nine days.
04:58Then you find a river running eastward, turn your back to it and fling the talisman over
05:03your shoulders.
05:05Most of his recipes are pretty straightforward and don't involve any magic.
05:09So this particular one raises questions.
05:12Where does the word abracadabra actually come from?
05:16And why is it written so that letters vanish?
05:19And what is a magic spell doing in a book of Roman medicine?
05:29Wearing protective talismans to warn against evil or protect against disease is an ancient
05:35practice that humanity has engaged in for tens of thousands of years and is seen around
05:40the world, including ancient Egypt, classic Greece, and even Rome.
05:45Rome.
05:46We might look at Rome, the great military conquests, these enormous engineering feats, and think
05:50that this is a society based entirely on logic and reason.
05:54But at the same time, magic and divination are absolutely present.
05:58Throughout this era of time, wearing protective amulets of all sorts are very common in the Roman
06:05empire.
06:06Boys and girls wear amulets called bulla and lanula to protect them until adulthood.
06:12Roman authors like Pliny the Elder of the first century AD write about amethysts and emeralds
06:19that are worn inscribed with symbols and incantations.
06:27Although amulets are said to provide protection against multiple diseases and ailments, they
06:33are most commonly used to protect the wearer from the same disease that Serenus recommends
06:37humans using abracadabra against.
06:43Quotidian fever.
06:45What some modern historians interpret as malaria.
06:50Spread by parasites transmitted by mosquitoes, the most common symptoms of malaria are fever,
06:57headache, and vomiting.
06:59But more serious cases can lead to coma, seizure, renal failure, and death.
07:06Rome has struggled with malaria since at least the second century BC.
07:12By the time of Serenus' protection charm, 400 years later, it is likely endemic to Rome
07:19with outbreaks every summer.
07:23Some of the yearly outbreaks are manageable, but others are absolutely devastating.
07:31We know in 79 AD there was a particularly bad year and a really bad outbreak from 450 AD we
07:38think
07:38may have contributed to the fall of the Roman Empire.
07:40We need to think really about the fear and anxiety that people at the time would have felt.
07:44They don't know where it's coming from, they don't know how to prevent it.
07:50The transmission of so many diseases in the ancient world and medieval world was a mystery.
07:57In ancient Rome, for example, it was noted that malarial outbreaks continually happened
08:03in the summer months.
08:04And so it was assumed that it had something to do with the humid, hot summer air.
08:11That somehow this bad air was infecting people with malaria.
08:17We call this belief miasma, the idea of foul air carrying disease.
08:23It's pretty terrifying because they don't know when this bad air is coming
08:28and they don't know how to prevent it or save themselves from it.
08:31It's getting more prevalent.
08:33You want to protect yourself or your family or you've had a family member succumb to it.
08:38You're more likely to be pushing for your own survival.
08:41We have a strong drive to make sure we survive, right?
08:45That survival instinct, that's going to drive you to find ways to protect yourself from malaria.
08:51So what's the harm in buying an amulet and wearing it?
08:57But that still doesn't answer the question.
09:00Why abracadabra?
09:01Why is it written in that strange disappearing triangle?
09:06What does the word mean?
09:10In a search to explain why the abracadabra charm is believed to have such powerful healing abilities,
09:17many scholars have looked for the origins of the word itself.
09:23Saranus doesn't tell us what abracadabra means or where it comes from.
09:26But, of course, there are several running theories.
09:28One of them is that it comes from the Aramaic phrase avragavra, which means I will create man.
09:35There's also several contenders in Hebrew that translate to the name of the blessed,
09:39I create as I speak, out bad spirit, out.
09:43And, of course, some scholars believe it's just a meaningless word to try and sound foreign and mystical and magical.
09:51Another theory of the origin of abracadabra comes from the Christian heretical sect Gnosticism,
09:57founded by the Greek teacher Basilides in the second century.
10:02Gnosticism adds elements of magic, numerology, and mythology onto traditional Christian beliefs.
10:10In some biographies of Saranus, it says that he was a follower of Basilides,
10:14although they don't really cite their sources.
10:17In Gnosticism, the god among gods is a being called Abraxas.
10:22The name Abraxas is also found on talismans from the second century on.
10:28And it's pretty easy to see how Abraxas could become Abra.
10:33So, this cross from Switzerland says Abrax Abraca.
10:37So, is this a reference to Abraxas?
10:40Is this a reference to Abracadabra?
10:42Or are the two interchangeable?
10:46The inscription on the Lausanne cross is consistent with protective amulets of the period,
10:51used to invoke spiritual safeguards.
10:56But the use of Abrax Abraca instead of Abracadabra
11:00may reflect more subtle regional differences
11:03that could be the result of a blend in culture,
11:06or simplification of the language for ritual use.
11:12This makes us wonder, is this inscription a deliberate cross
11:15between Christian tradition and the Gnostic formula?
11:19This might not be about the word itself, but actually how it's written.
11:24Serenus' method of writing words in a triangular pattern with disappearing letters
11:28is not unique to the Abracadabra spell.
11:34Sometimes referred to as Dilecio Morbi,
11:37vanishing name spells are found throughout the Roman Empire
11:41on amulets intended to protect the wearer from disease.
11:46Most of the amulets seem to be Greek or Egyptian,
11:49which at this point are both part of the Roman Empire,
11:53and the inscriptions are almost always written in Greek.
11:58Sometimes it's fairly clear what the amulet is meant to protect you from.
12:02The word for the disease is simply on the amulet.
12:05But some of these amulets have other words on them
12:08where the meaning isn't so clear.
12:11And one of these words that shows up is the word ablanathanalba.
12:15It's hard not to notice at least a superficial similarity
12:18between ablanathanalba and abracadabra.
12:21And is it a coincidence that both of them are being invoked to try and cure fever?
12:26But however they may be related,
12:28nobody today is saying ablanathanalba as they're pulling a rabbit out of a hat.
12:31So how is it then that abracadabra becomes the word associated with magic?
12:37A thousand years later, in the medieval period,
12:41European scholars become increasingly fascinated by the knowledge of the past
12:45and eagerly study the writings of ancient Greek and Latin authors.
12:51The reason why the word abracadabra continues throughout history
12:55could be because it's written down in a Latin medical textbook.
13:01While Serenus was never considered at quite the same level as other great classical authors,
13:06he was still considered important enough that his main work,
13:09the Liber Medicinalis, was also recopied.
13:11And it's from a 13th century manuscript that was held at a Benedictine monastery
13:16that we have his notation of abracadabra.
13:28But much like the Roman's fear of malaria, it is the emergence of a terrifying plague
13:35that will once again drive the masses to turn to the medical magic of abracadabra.
13:44In 1665, London is ravaged by the bubonic plague.
13:50While the wealthy can easily escape the city,
13:53the poor are trapped in cramped and filthy conditions
13:56that allow the disease to run rampant
14:00and eventually kill one-fifth of the city's population.
14:05Daniel Defoe, the author of Robinson Crusoe,
14:08who was alive at a time of another reoccurrence of the plague in London,
14:13describes how people were fearful
14:15and they turned to magical talismans
14:19where they inscribed the phrase abracadabra on them
14:23and wore them around their necks as a way of protecting themselves from the plague.
14:27We look back at this idea of magic being used to cure malaria
14:33when the plague hit.
14:35Were they hoping that they can control it once again using magic?
14:43But abracadabra's transformation from medical protector to magical incantation
14:48will not be complete until 1819
14:51when it appears in a stage play called Rochester,
14:55written by William Thomas Moncrief.
14:58It's in Rochester that we see really the first modern use of the phrase abracadabra
15:04to be a catch-all magical phrase.
15:07When the character utters hocus-pocus abracadabra.
15:12This theatrical utterance marks the word's journey
15:16from a once sacred medicinal tool to a stage trick for entertainment.
15:21The rise of scientific skepticism sees the word abracadabra
15:25lose any medical associations.
15:29The scientific revolution has largely replaced magical ideas with rational thought.
15:35But abracadabra clearly continues to hold sway today
15:39and is even perhaps considered one of the unforgivable curses.
15:45While the ancient Romans used magic words in amulets to treat diseases,
15:51mysterious prescriptions from 7th century China suggest using ingredients that are much more organic.
16:05In Hainan Province, China, a stunning display of art and human achievement stretches out over one kilometer along both sides
16:13of the banks of the Yi River.
16:21Carved out of the steep limestone cliffs, the Longman Grottoes is a collection of almost 111,000 stone statues and
16:322,800 inscriptions.
16:35Displayed within 2,300 hand-carved caves and niches.
16:42It is an undertaking that took 250 years, starting in the late 5th century until its completion in the mid
16:518th century.
16:56A sacred site dedicated to Buddhism, the location has attracted pilgrims since the 6th century
17:03and has been a source of reverence and wonderment ever since.
17:09But among the towering statues and inscriptions of devotion, one cave is slightly different than the rest.
17:18On the walls of Yao Fang Dong Cave are carved medical prescriptions and treatments.
17:26These recipes are over a thousand years old, and they've been hand-carved into the wall.
17:32This is something completely unique. As far as we know, there's nothing else quite like it in China.
17:37Where do they come from? Who inscribed them? Why are they at a Buddhist shrine?
17:47Etched on the north, south, and east-facing walls of the Yao Fang Dong Cave are approximately 154 recipes
17:55listed to treat 41 different diseases of dermatology, internal medicine, and urology.
18:04They're often referred to as the Longmen recipes, and they're organized by disease.
18:09Within each recipe, you'll find the name of the disease, the primary cure for it, and then some alternative cure
18:15suggestions as well.
18:18Although it is not clear precisely when the recipes were inscribed,
18:21many historians believe they were carved between 650 and 653 AD.
18:29Most of the other inscriptions at the Longmen grottos have a clear message, which includes the name of the person
18:35and the date.
18:37The Longmen recipes don't have any of that, which means that for centuries historians have wondered where and who these
18:44recipes are coming from.
18:46Although the author of the prescriptions is unknown, the intended audience seems to be more clear.
18:54The Longmen formulas seem to be intentionally simple and easily accessible for the average person.
19:00Many of the ingredients are readily available in a typical household.
19:05For example, a recipe to cure sores simply calls to boil your willow and wash your sores with the water.
19:12Or an alternative provided is to pound some chives and spread it on the boils.
19:18This presents a very different philosophy than how medicine was approached in China at that time.
19:28The Longmen recipes are carved during the Tang dynasty, a period of time where access to trained physicians is largely
19:35reserved for the royal family and other elites or for those living in urban centers.
19:43These medical beliefs are rooted in elements of religion, but also philosophy and spiritualism.
19:49This can be a real barrier to entry if you don't have any kind of formal training.
19:55Medicine is treated almost like a secret handed down between families or from a master to apprentice.
20:01At this point in time, people are organized into small communities and they're often on their own.
20:06If you got ill, it was the knowledge and the skills of the people within the village that were likely
20:11the only things you had access to.
20:13You weren't going to be able to go to other sites.
20:18Based on the kinds of diseases that the Longmen recipes were written to treat, we start to get an idea
20:23of what type of illnesses people were really dealing with in their daily lives.
20:30The recipes include treatment for skin disorders such as sores, wounds and lesions, diseases like jaundice and fever, internal issues
20:39like heart pain, diarrhea and constipation, and physical injuries such as stab wounds, insect poisoning and bleeding.
20:49Any time you start to see these barriers to health care arise, it means that the social order starts to
20:55shape themselves around medical barriers or medical access.
20:59In this context, people started looking for help elsewhere.
21:12Tales of Buddhist healers with incredible powers start to spread throughout China.
21:18As Buddhist monasteries spread throughout China over the following centuries, they become known as places of charity and community support
21:27in times of famine.
21:31By the fifth and sixth centuries, they have also become known as places to receive medical care.
21:37As the popularity of Buddhism in China began to spread in the first century, we also see the increasing involvement
21:44of Buddhist monks in health care in general.
21:47Buddhist monasteries began to operate as infirmaries and bathhouses, places where everyday people could go and receive medical care.
21:56The Buddhists are providing a completely new approach to medicine, something that they had never experienced before, a true alternative.
22:08Yet at the Longman Grottoes, medical care extends beyond the services provided by Buddhist monks.
22:15Here, medical knowledge itself is freely available to the public.
22:22By the time the recipes are inscribed in Yaofang Dong Cave in 650 AD, the Longman Grottoes have already become
22:30a popular place of pilgrimage for over 100 years.
22:35Buddhists from all walks of life travel from far and wide to seek blessings and make votive offerings.
22:43These recipes, being so public-facing, really in a way represent Buddhism putting a stake in the ground, saying, we're
22:52here and this is what we do.
22:55Health care and the alleviation of pain and suffering is really part of an ethical framework for these Buddhists.
23:02They believe that performing these selfless and compassionate acts can generate good karma.
23:08When there's religious leaders involved in health care practices, it means that the values that they hold tend to inform
23:16how they practice and what they practice as well.
23:19These two elements of religion and healing and health care are much more integrated in the past than we would
23:25think about them today.
23:29One might assume the mystery is solved.
23:32Buddhist monks or someone associated with Buddhism inscribe simple prescriptions to provide access and generate karma.
23:40But the reality is far more complicated.
23:44There's still one more question we don't have the answer to.
23:47Where do these recipes come from?
23:51Traditional Chinese medicine is based on a series of classic canonical texts that date back thousands of years.
24:01The long man recipes themselves cannot be found in such texts and their use of specific ingredients truly mark their
24:08departure from tradition.
24:12Some of the most uncommon ingredients include human hair, hedgehog skin, and dung from earthworms, swallows, horses, cows, and even
24:24humans.
24:27One recipe for cramps suggests use the whites from chicken dung, mix in water, and bring to a boil three
24:35times and take it immediately.
24:38Interestingly, the recipe also adds, don't let the patient know what it is.
24:44Dung has been used as a medical ingredient throughout history, including by the ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans.
24:54It's very rare for Chinese recipes to include these kinds of ingredients.
24:59So to all of a sudden see 17 recipes that involve some sort of dung or urine, it makes you
25:05think, what is going on here?
25:07These sorts of ingredients might be surprising in the context of traditional Chinese medicine, but if you take that step
25:13back and look at how different resources and plants and animals were used in the past, it's not so surprising
25:20that people would use what's at their disposal as a trial and error to see what works and what doesn't.
25:27Although the long man recipes are not seen in China in the period of time before the inscriptions were written,
25:33similar recipes from the same time period are found elsewhere in China.
25:44In Dunhuang, China, researchers discover a treasure trove of thousands of manuscripts written over several centuries.
25:56The manuscripts contain medical recipes that are extremely similar to the long man recipes and seem to come from exactly
26:03the same period of time.
26:07Some researchers believe that they may have been copied from a shared source.
26:13Although animal dung is not commonly seen in Chinese medical recipes before the long man and Dunhuang recipes, it is
26:21often seen in Ayurvedic medicine.
26:26Ayurveda is a holistic system of medicine that originates in India over 3000 years ago.
26:32Although different in many ways, Buddhism and Ayurveda share similarities that lead many historians to believe they both evolved from
26:41a common belief system.
26:44In the 7th century, Indian and Ayurvedic principles are continuing to influence Chinese Buddhists.
26:51There's this fluid exchange of Indian Buddhist monks coming into China and sharing practices as well as Chinese monks going
27:00to India and studying there.
27:04Perhaps most interestingly is the existence of an Indian Buddhist monk named Bhagavad Dharma who lived in China around 650
27:13to 660 AD and translated Indian Buddhist texts to Chinese.
27:19One of the texts translated by the monk contains 42 medical recipes.
27:24Six of them use animal dung and are very similar to the recipes found at Longmen and Dunghuang.
27:33Regardless of where the recipes come from, some of their concepts start to slowly incorporate and be adapted into Chinese
27:40medicine itself.
27:42They even start to expand out of China.
27:47The Japanese medical dictionary, Hanzo Wamyo, published in 918 AD, contains 108 recipes from the caves entitled The Longmen 108.
28:01They are repeated again in Japan in the Ishimpo Formulus of the Heart of Medicine published in 984.
28:13Although Buddhism's expanding popularity during the first millennia is embraced by many Chinese emperors, it is not embraced by all
28:22of them.
28:25In the 9th century, Emperor Wu Zhang enacts a violent suppression of Buddhism, leading to the closure of almost 40
28:34,000 Buddhist shrines and temples.
28:38In the 10th century, the Song dynasty reforms all official medical texts to elevate pre-Buddhist medicine, sidelining the types
28:47of medicine and practices found in the Longmen grottoes.
28:52Despite the periods of oppression of Buddhism in China, certain elements of their healing practices are permanently embedded into Chinese
29:00thought.
29:02Even today, there's a Chinese saying, everything is medicine. A belief that likely traces back to Indian Buddhist thought.
29:12For now, the origin of the unique ingredients in the Longmen recipes remains unknown. Their true story, still entombed in
29:21stone.
29:29Halfway around the world, in medieval Poland, the soil yields its own secrets in traces of folk rituals and the
29:37mysterious women who once guarded them.
29:43In the village of Kaduz, Poland, on the edge of the Vistula River Valley lies the hidden remains of the
29:52medieval town of Kulman.
29:55Although a grass-covered hill is now the only indication of what was once a bustling settlement, the site has
30:02been a treasure trove for the archaeologists who have excavated it over the last 200 years.
30:12Of particular value is the graveyard, one of the largest found in this part of Europe.
30:18It contains over 1500 burials, but researchers are interested in one in particular.
30:27In the grave of an elderly woman from the 11th century, they find a small cylindrical object that has been
30:34completely burned.
30:35It almost looks like a bullet, but it is actually a belemnite, the fossilized remains of the tail of a
30:44squid.
30:47Researchers believe it has been placed there because of its healing qualities and possibly its connection to secret magic rituals.
30:56This fossilized squid is one of 24 found across the entire site of Kulman, including in areas we associate with
31:08religious rituals.
31:11These squid bring up a lot of questions. What are they doing here? Why are they being placed in graves?
31:17Do they have something to do with medicine? Are there any sort of magical rituals going on?
31:24No.
31:25Up until the mid-10th century, much of Poland is occupied by disparate groups of Slavic tribes, who leave behind
31:32almost no written record of their society or their beliefs.
31:37But through conquest and strategic alliance, by 963, much of Poland has been solidified under the rule of a man
31:46named Mieszko I of the Piaz dynasty, the first ruling family of Poland.
31:53Mieszko also begins the process of merging and reforming the Slavic tribes. As part of that process, the medieval town
32:02of Kulman is established in the mid-10th century.
32:05This isn't a particularly large site. It's about 15 hectares, but includes an extensive group of houses and settlements clustered
32:13around a hilltop fort.
32:15It's one of the capitals of the Piaz state and an important political and economic center.
32:23Strategically located at the intersection of two important trade routes between Eastern Europe and the Baltic Sea, Kulman grows quickly
32:31into an extensive settlement with trades and craftsmen.
32:35In this burial ground, there are a range of different people. Some are more wealthy, you have some merchants, but
32:42for the most part, those that are buried here are peasants.
32:47Although Kulman may have been a busy economic center, the daily life of a peasant is not easy.
32:53If you're a man, there's a lot of heavy labor, whereas women marry early and their lifespan is short due
33:01to high childbirth mortality rates.
33:04Children learn a craft from their parents and start work as early as 12 years old.
33:09This is not an easy life at all, and it's probably made more difficult by the fact that we see
33:14signs that this is not a very healthy population.
33:18Of 661 skeletons studied from the Kulman graveyard, almost half show evidence of significant health conditions that would have impacted
33:27their daily life.
33:30When you see a significant amount of illness or injury in a skeletal population, it means two things.
33:35The first being that they withstood a lot of very difficult life and also survived it because it showed up
33:44on the bone, which would take a significant amount of time.
33:46That also suggests evidence of community care.
33:50They're supporting each other and helping each other through these day-to-day stressors.
33:58However, archaeologists digging at Kulman report they find no specialized or sophisticated medical tools.
34:07They report that the only evidence of medicals they find are knives, sickles, and belemnites.
34:13It raises the question, what kind of medical care are they actually receiving, and how are they being treated by
34:23sickles and squids?
34:28The city of Kulman is formed during a restless changing time in Poland.
34:34Mieszko I marries a Christian royal from Bohemia.
34:39In 966 AD, he is baptized and begins the process of converting the rest of his country to Christianity.
34:47When Mieszko converts to Christianity, we see the arrival of Benedictine monks who set up monasteries.
34:52And these are charitable institutions where visitors can go to receive herbalism care, nursing care, really a Christian-based medical
34:59treatment.
35:01But although the elites of Poland have converted to Christianity, most people, particularly those in rural areas, retain their pagan
35:10beliefs.
35:13One hint we do have about what people thought about the arrival of Christianity is the so-called pagan revolt
35:18of 1034.
35:21We have evidence that churches were burned, that priests were being killed, and we think that something like this may
35:28have been also happening at Kulman.
35:29We see the foundation of a church that was started to be built, but never finished.
35:34The medical practices of the peasants in Poland are deeply tied to their pagan beliefs, and are steeped in magical,
35:42mystical rituals.
35:47In Western Europe, at this time, you typically seek help from male healers, such as Benedictine monks or male physicians.
35:56But in Slavic societies, you seek the wise women.
36:00These are traditionally elderly women, well-respected in their communities, with a lifetime's worth of knowledge and healing.
36:08Traditionally, wise women are associated with a lot of medicinal herbs, and we do find evidence that some of these
36:13were actually used at Kulman.
36:17But the wise women of Kulman's healing practices do not begin and end with a collection of herbs.
36:24In order to protect you against an illness, a wise woman might make you a protective amulet or talisman.
36:31Or she might perform magic healing rituals with prayers and incantations, all involving ritual actions and objects.
36:38Without any written records, how can we tell what types of rituals were being performed?
36:43And how did the Belem Knights fit into this, and why are they being placed in the grave of this
36:46woman?
36:50Belem Knights are what remains of a now extinct species of squid that lived in an ancient ocean that covered
36:58Europe during the Jurassic and Cretaceous period.
37:04Unlike modern squid, Belem Knights have a hard internal skeleton.
37:11And their tail was made of incredibly tough calcite crystals.
37:17As a result, they are extremely hardy, and can be found even under conditions where other fossils have not been
37:24preserved.
37:27Although found elsewhere in the world, they are particularly bountiful in Northern Europe.
37:33Belem Knights are not rare. Actually, you can still find them pretty easily today along a lot of beaches, even
37:38in some places in forests where the soil has eroded away.
37:41This is because we think that they went to these ancestral spawning grounds, made it, and then died en masse.
37:47And so when we find them today, the part of the Belem Knight that's fossilized looks kind of like a
37:51bullet.
37:51So these caches have been called Belem Knight battlefields.
37:57They've been known about and recommended for use in medicine for thousands of years, even if not everyone recognized what
38:04they actually are.
38:06Maybe the people in the village would have no experience with them.
38:11And that means that it's otherworldly, and if it's otherworldly, it can have other powers.
38:15And those other powers are what's giving rise to the belief in the mystical power of the healing rituals that
38:23they're undergoing.
38:26First century naturalists like Pliny the Elder and Dioscordes recommended Belem Knights to cure diseases like jaundice and bladder stones.
38:36They also appear in 12th and 13th century medical texts in Germany and France for a variety of uses, including
38:46bladder stones, stomach aches, and malaria.
38:51In Slavic folk medicine, Belem Knights are called lightning bolts.
38:56They believe Belem Knights fall to the earth during thunderstorms, and that they've got magical power to protect people from
39:04misfortunes and diseases.
39:07In medieval Poland, and even well into the 19th century, Belem Knights are used as a cure-all to treat
39:15topical diseases such as burns, ulcers, and blood.
39:18And warts.
39:21But also internal ailments such as abdominal pain, headache, toothache, eye disease, fever, and hemorrhages.
39:31The wise women are using Belem Knights in a variety of ways.
39:34You can wear it like an amulet or a talisman.
39:36You could rub it on an area that's feeling pain.
39:39Or you can scrape off a bit of the Belem Knight and mix it up with some milk and vodka
39:42for a pretty exciting brew.
39:4524 Belem Knights are found throughout the site of Kuhlman, mostly in household storage pits or in areas associated with
39:54religious practices.
39:56But one Belem Knight is discovered in the grave of a 60- to 70-year-old woman.
40:02What we can start to infer is what her role might have been.
40:06It could have been that she was one of these wise women healers.
40:09It could also mean that she was buried with this as a form of protection herself from what's to come
40:14in the afterlife.
40:17Although there are no written records of the kinds of rituals performed at Kuhlman,
40:23researchers believe that the archaeology can provide a hint at how the wise women practice their magic.
40:31We have some ideas as to what might be happening during these rituals.
40:34We think a wise woman is chanting some incantations.
40:39We think that she is grinding and burning herbs like black elderflower.
40:43We think the wise woman would have also been performing some symbolic gestures.
40:47So taking a literal sickle and then cutting through the air in front of the ill person,
40:52symbolically cutting through the disease.
40:56Over the following centuries, the beliefs of the people of Poland evolve, but they don't fully change.
41:03Christianity starts to exert more and more influence in the Polish people,
41:07but they never really let go fully of their beliefs.
41:09They just fold in the Christian beliefs.
41:11There's still a lot of the same incantations and prayers being said,
41:15but they're just now being said to the Christian saints.
41:21The act of healing someone by using magical words, incantations, or non-canonical prayers
41:27is seen as witchcraft by the church.
41:31Like many other European countries, Poland engages in witch trials.
41:41They prosecute women for using herbs and magic to heal.
41:52Yet, this doesn't fully erase such practices, but merely drives them underground.
41:57Over time, the more ritualistic elements of these beliefs and practices disappear.
42:04But trust in herbal medicine in Poland remains firmly entrenched within the culture
42:10and endures in rural villages to this day.
42:13Polish folk beliefs are still incredibly important.
42:16So connecting some of that living history with these archaeological sites
42:20really gives us that sense of the resonance of the past and the present.
42:24This site is a reminder of the deeply entrenched values of folk medicine
42:28through different parts of Polish culture.
42:31It's almost a site of resistance against these imposed values,
42:35and it's coming in a place where we historically tend to gloss over
42:38how disruptive that conflict would have been for a lengthy period of time.
42:44Although the wise women of Kuhlman performed very different kinds of medicine,
42:48as the folk healers in Poland today,
42:51it shows that even modern practices can be firmly rooted in the mysterious workings of the past.
43:01As with the protective incantations kept in Roman times,
43:06or the strange recipes broadcast in Chinese stone,
43:11it seems some of medicine's greatest powers have always been found not just in what we can access,
43:17but in what we dare to believe.
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