What a Mad Bull, a Dunghill, and the Stars Taught a 17th-Century Doctor About Medicine

What a Mad Bull, a Dunghill, and the Stars Taught a 17th-Century Doctor About Medicine

Introduction: A Glimpse into a Forgotten World of Healing

Step into a modern clinic, and you enter a world of sterile surfaces, precise measurements, and evidence-based protocols. Medicine today is a science of the measurable. But rewind the clock 400 years, and you would find a world of healing where a poultice of boiled fleawort and honey could cure swellings under the ears, and the right phase of the moon was as critical as the right herb.

This was the world of Nicholas Culpeper, the 17th-century English physician, botanist, and astrologer. His masterwork, The Complete Herbal, is a remarkable window into a time when medicine was not separate from the cosmos but deeply intertwined with it. To read Culpeper is to understand that for our ancestors, a plant was not just a biological organism; it was a cosmic actor, stamped with divine clues and governed by celestial forces.

While his prescriptions might seem bizarre today, they were guided by a complex and surprisingly coherent set of principles. Here are five of the most astonishing truths from Culpeper's world that will change how you see the weeds in your own garden.

1. Your Health is Written in the Stars

Long before microscopes and chemical analysis, Culpeper believed that the hidden virtues of plants were revealed not by their composition, but by their celestial rulers. In his system of "astrological botany," every plant, every disease, and every part of the human body was under the dominion of a planet. It’s a staggering thought: to see illness not as a malfunction, but as a cosmic imbalance—a discordant note in the music of the spheres that could be retuned with a simple weed.

The goal of healing was to restore this cosmic equilibrium, which could be achieved through different mechanisms. A primary method was antipathy, or opposition. A disease caused by the influence of one planet was best treated with an herb governed by its opposite. For instance, Culpeper advises that ailments of the aggressive, fiery Mars should be treated with herbs of the gentle, cool Venus. It wasn't about chemistry; it was about restoring a universal harmony, revealing a worldview obsessed with finding order and correspondence in everything.

You may oppose diseases by Herbs of the planet, opposite to the planet that causes them: as diseases of Jupiter by herbs of Mercury, and the contrary; diseases of the Luminaries by the herbs of Saturn, and the contrary; diseases of Mars by herbs of Venus, and the contrary.

2. Plants Literally Wear Their Cures on the Outside

How did healers first discover which plant cured which ailment? For Culpeper, the answer was simple: God left clues. This idea, known as the "Doctrine of Signatures," proposed that a plant’s physical appearance—its shape, color, or texture—was a divine sign pointing to its medicinal use. Nature was a book, and plants were the words, waiting to be read. Culpeper defended this ancient wisdom against the scoffs of his contemporaries, arguing it was the very foundation of herbal knowledge.

...by the icon, or image of every herb, the ancients at first found out their virtues. Modern writers laugh at them for it; but I wonder in my heart, how the virtues of herbs came at first to be known, if not by their signatures...

As a prime example of this principle in action, Culpeper points to Pilewort. He argues with absolute certainty that its root provides a "verification of the learning of the ancients," because if you dig it up, "you shall perceive the perfect image of the disease which they commonly call the piles." The logical conclusion? A decoction of this root, he claims, "wonderfully helps piles and hæmorrhoids." To the 17th-century mind, this was not a coincidence but a clear message from the Creator, embedding the cure directly within the image of the sickness itself.

3. Forget the Garden; Wild Weeds Are More Potent

In our modern agricultural world, we tend to value cultivation. We breed plants for size, heartiness, and yield. But Culpeper held a counter-intuitive belief: the most medicinally powerful herbs were often not the carefully tended ones in the garden, but their scrappy, wild relatives.

In his entry on Carrots, he notes this as a general rule. This idea speaks to a profound respect for the untamed power of nature, suggesting a theological belief that God’s unmediated creation (the wild) is inherently more virtuous than man's modified version (the garden). It implies that domestication, while useful, could dilute the essential spirit or virtue of a plant. What was wild was purer, more concentrated, and ultimately more potent in its healing effects.

...almost in all herbs the wild are the most effectual in physic, as being more powerful in operation than the garden kinds...

4. The Best Medicines are Common, Cheap, and Sometimes Stinky

Culpeper was a man of the people, a fierce advocate for making medicine accessible to the poor. He railed against the idea that the best remedies were rare, exotic, or expensive. On the contrary, he believed that God’s most powerful and universal medicines were freely available to all—even if you had to find them on a dunghill.

His prime example is "Wild and Stinking Arrach," a common weed he praises as a "universal medicine for the womb." He notes with satisfaction that it is "common almost upon every dunghill," a testament to his philosophy that divine remedies are not hidden away for the wealthy but are provided abundantly for everyone. He even passionately pleads with his rich readers to make syrups of the herb for their poor neighbors, blending his medical advice with a powerful social conscience.

The works of God are freely given to man, his medicines are common and cheap, and easily to be found. I commend it for an universal medicine for the womb, and such a medicine as will easily, safely, and speedily cure any disease thereof...

5. Need to Tame a Mad Bull? Find a Fig Tree.

While much of Culpeper's work deals with human ailments, some entries reveal the full breadth of his worldview, where plants possess "occult qualities"—hidden virtues that could influence not just health, but the very behavior of animals and the forces of nature. From his perspective, these were not magic, but tangible properties to be discovered and utilized.

His entry on the Fig Tree contains two extraordinary claims. First, he states that like the Bay Tree, it is never struck by lightning. But even more remarkably, he asserts that the tree has a pacifying effect on enraged animals. This illustrates a worldview where the metaphysical spirit of a plant was just as real and impactful as its physical substance. What we might call folk magic, Culpeper saw as applied natural philosophy; the "gentleness" of the Fig Tree was a tangible force that could subdue the rage of a bull, demonstrating a universe alive with sympathies and powers we no longer perceive.

...if you tie a bull, be he ever so mad, to a Fig Tree, he will quickly become tame and gentle.

Conclusion: The Wisdom in the Weeds

Reading Culpeper is like deciphering a map to a lost world. His principles—astrological, symbolic, and deeply spiritual—seem bizarre to our modern sensibilities. And yet, they were part of a coherent and deeply thoughtful system for making sense of humanity's place in a living, interconnected cosmos. His work reminds us that for most of human history, healing was not about isolating a chemical compound, but about restoring balance between the body, the earth, and the stars.

It makes you wonder: which of our own modern certainties will seem like charming, half-forgotten magic to the people of the 25th century?