Paleomedicine and the Evolutionary Context of Medicinal Plant Use

Abstract

Modern human need for medicines is so extensive that it is thought to be a deep evolutionary behavior. There is abundant evidence from our Paleolithic and later prehistoric past, of survival after periodontal disease, traumas, and invasive medical treatments including trepanations and amputations, suggesting a detailed, applied knowledge of medicinal plant secondary compounds. Direct archeological evidence for use of plants in the Paleolithic is rare, but evidence is growing. An evolutionary context for early human use of medicinal plants is provided by the broad evidence for animal self-medication, in particular, of non-human primates. During the later Paleolithic, there is evidence for the use of poisonous and psychotropic plants, suggesting that Paleolithic humans built on and expanded their knowledge and use of plant secondary compounds.

Keywords: Human self-medication; Medicinal plants; Paleolithic; Psychoactive plants; Raw materials.

Fig. 1

Reconstructed total ion chromatogram of the pyrogram (pyrolysis profile (610° for 10) after thermal desorption (310° for 10 s). Peak identities (x indicates carbon chain length): filled diamonds, Cx:0 indicates saturated fatty acid methyl esters; filled squares, Cx indicates alkenes; filled circles, Cx indicates alkanes; inverted triangles, a is fluoranthene and b is pyrene. Ph is phytane and Pr is pristane. Peak 1 is 2-methyl-2-cyclopenten-1-one and 2 is 2,3-dimethyl-2-cyclopentene-1-one. Insert displays a reconstructed total ion chromatogram of the thermal desorption profile (reproduced from Hardy et al. 2012)

Fig. 2

Proportions of plants with medicinal compounds from Paleolithic sites, against modern averages (data taken from Hardy 2019)

Fig. 3

Silybum marianum (L.) Gaertn., Asteraceae. Image taken at the 780,000-year-old site of Gesher Benot Ya’aqov (GBY), Israel, February 2019. Many of the plants found in the archeological site are present today in the surrounding area

Fig. 4

Relative proportions of plants with edible, edible and medicinal, and medicinal (and sometimes poisonous) plants, over time (data taken from Hardy 2019)

Fig. 5

Tyrolean Iceman (Ötzi). © South Tyrolean Museum of Archaeology/EURAC/Marco Samadelli-Gregor Staschitz. Injuries, ailments, and tattoos found on the frontal upper body (data taken from Zink et al. and Samadelli et al. 2015)