[Sca-cooks] Thoughts on food as medicine

[Suey]

Raphaella wrote:


>   ????? I'm currently doing research on fertility and childbirth in Renaissance
> Italy... One of the things that jumped out at me in this
> article is a list of diet recommendations for women who are weak and thin or
> experiencing blood loss

Wheat was the first food to represent fertility. Ancient Greeks 
dedicated quinces to the goddess of love and thought them to be the 
symbol of fertility. In the Arab world figs were synonymous with**love 
and fertility. Sweet almonds were thrown on newly weds as a symbol of 
fertility. In Al-Andalus cucumber came to mean fertility as well as 
carrots. Hawthorn symbolized spring, hope, marriage and fertility. In 
Europe, parsley seeds were eaten by men and women to increase fertility 
but not in England. Parsley is not recorded there until 1548.

Avenzoar , 1091-1161, physician of the Almoravide and Almorhad Emirs of 
Cordova,claimed that men and women should ingested ivory shavings before 
having sex in order for the woman to become pregnant. He continued to 
state that if the left paw of a hare is hung on the woman's thigh during 
sex she will become pregnant as it possesses that peculiarity; 
nevertheless to insure this effect another paw should be hung on the 
girdle of the man. Avenzoar thought that pregnant mothers, during the 
last trimester of their term, should eat pawns and other shellfish such 
as lobster and shrimp, asthey contain what we now call Omega 3, a 
polyunsaturated acid, that helps the development of intelligence and the 
brain. A medieval wives' tale is that pregnant women who ate plenty of 
quinces produced very intelligent children.


Those are some nicities. There were some pretty gross ways to get women 
pregnant you do not want to hear about.
Bleeding was not common in Spain as Avenzoar was against it.


Someone mentioned medicinal food. A book can be written on that. Almost 
all foods were used as medication in the Middle Ages.

Humors in foods is a very complexed topic about which a book could be 
written as well.

Suey