Navajo Medicine

The rabbitbrush is generally scorned because it supplies food primarily to the rodents. It grows most abundantly at low altitudes on deep alkaline, arid, or semi-arid soil; and its companions are usually saltbrush, greasewood, and sage. However, it it weren’t for this homely bush, some parts of the desert which lack water and are rich in alkali would be almost completely barren and unattractive. Its deep and extensive roots are impediments to wind and water and erosion. In the late summer it becomes more attractive because of its small yellow flowers, which grow in clusters of five to thirty. The Navajos have always valued the flowers as ingredients of a decoction for dyeing wool yellow. Pg. 144

Guayule, a species known as the rubber rabbitbrush, contains rubber. With the stoppage of imported rubber from the South Pacific, it became on of the most important crops in the West. The Indians have always appreciated the rubber rabbitbrush because they have derived chewing gum from its wood and bark. Pg. 144

Sagebrush often brings on hayfever in susceptible individuals. Made into tea, it is used by Navajos to treat colds and diarrhea, as an eye and hair wash, as a general tonic, and as an antiseptic for wounds. It also provides abundant fuel for the Navajo hogans. Pg. 145

The fungi growing on tree trunks are of different shades of yellow and are almost as colorful as the rocks lichens. They too are disintegrating agents, hastening the decomposition of old tree trunks. One of these fungi, known as bracket fungus, was formerly used by the Navajos as punk for carrying fire. Pg. 146

The medicine man knows his herbs, where to get them, and how to prepare them, even though they are of only secondary importance in the ceremony of chasing out the evil spirit by magic and the propitiation of the gods. When collecting his seeds, leaves, or roots for the preparation of powders or infusions, he is careful that the plants and earth out of which all these good things come are not offended. After locating a desired plant, he sprinkles ceremonial corn pollen over it. He talks to it, sings to it, and gives presents to it. His presents are turquoise, shell, or some other mineral – gifts he would offer to his gods or his best friends – for he considers plants to be animate creatures. After he has said prayers, he leaves the plant, going around it sunwise to gather plants of the same species in the vicinity. By starting from the east and going through the south to the west, he follows the sun and thus imitates its beneficences. Of course, it is possible that some of the herbs contain valuable drugs which some day we may be able to isolate; but if we do, these will be new drugs which are not known to Navajos as such. The amount of any real drug which we may be able to isolate must be present in today’s Navajo medicinal infusions in only infinitesimal doses – not enough to produce definite therapeutic benefit. However, we must leave this problem to our research pharmacologists to ferret out. If an infusion or tea has to be made from these herbs, a medicine man is called in to prepare the concoction, say prayers, and sing for one to three nights from sunset to sunrise.

Among some of the most common herbs which he uses in his rituals are:

Alum root – He prepares a mush from its leaves and uses it as an astringent. He also mixes it with apoplappus and applies it with the aid of a heated stone to an aching tooth.

Amaranthus – For the relief of itching.

Apoplappus (Goldenweeds ) -See Alum root.

Artemisia – For skin wounds, boils, and burns.

Atriplex – To stop itching and cure warts.

Barberry – A tonic for stiff joints.

Brickellia – For colds, flu, coughs, and tuberculosis.

Butterweeds – To relieve rheumatism, which he ascribes to improper contact with menstruating women. Women develop joint trouble because of menstruation. The Navajo word for menstruation,” ‘rheumatism,” and “hunchback” is the same, with only a slight difference in accent.

Blue-eyed grass, aster, silkweed – In pulverized form to cure eye sores.

Buttercup and Cordylanthus ramosus – The powder is taken with water every morning for syphilis.

Chenopoduim (Pigweed ) – Used for purging.

Cirisium – Infusion drops for eye diseases.

Commelina – Aphrodisiac for aged men and women.

Compositea group (Yellow Plant) – Flowers made into tea to cure colds.

Confinement medicines – Greasewood and sagebrush he considers wonderful aids to delivery; while watercress and silkweed he administers as a tonic for the mother after the baby has arrived.

Criptantha Jamesi – Infusion drops for earache.

Datura (Jimson weed) – The only narcotic he has. The leaves and seed chewed up or made into an infusion produce narcosis for minor operations and childbirth. He also uses it for diagnostic purposes:the patient or medicine man’s assistant is given some of the root to chew to get into a dream-like state so that he will talk and perhaps give clues to the cause of the patient’s illness. When used in excess, it produces a drunken-like state. Under its influence men phrophesy, dance, and act in various strange ways. It is said that most Navajo men always have a little of it in their pockets.

Ephedra – See Mormon tea.

Eriogonum of various types – As a lotion and poultice to cure sore throat and wounds. It is given internally for diarrhea.

Eriogonum of James – Drunk as a contraceptive.

Evening primrose (Big night bloomer) – Used for snake bites. Its leaves are ground with fuller’s earth and mixed with corn pollen and water to bathe the sore.

Euphorbia – For indigestion.

Gaillardia pinnatifolia – The leaves and branchlets are crushed, added to lukewarm water, and taken internally to cure gout.

Gentian – For headache, as a snuff. Also as a narcotic and to produce dreams.

Greasewood – See Confinement Medicines.

Gumweed – For coughs; also externally for sores.

Hawkweeds – As a diuretic.

Horseweed – Used as a diuretic, tonic, and astringent. It is also considered valuable in diarrhea and parturitional hemorrhage.

Jimson Weed – See Datura.

Joint fir of Torrey – See Mormon tea.

Juniper (the red variety) – The inner bark, when rubbed into the scalp, cures dandruff and falling hair in both men and women. Also when mixed with another bark and two weeds and made into a tea, it cures diarrhea.

Larkspur – To stop bleeding.

Lichens – Chewed for diseases of the mouth, sore gums, canker, caries.

Linnum (Prairie flax) – Used as a hemostatic.

Loco weed (oxytropis or Aragallus) – Grows four inches high and has small purple flowers. Given to women to prevent conception.

Lupins Kin gii – For boils.

Manzanita bark and one of the mullens – Used as nico tin.

Milkweed – When crushed between the fingers along with a number of other plants and then stirred in a bowl of water, it makes a good stomachic.

Monarda pectinata – For headaches.

Mormon tea – For general stomach and genito-urinary troubles. Its infusion has an effect similar to Belladonna. It is sold in Utah City under different names as a blood purifier.

Nicotiana – ( Mountain tobacco) – Its smoke is blown into the patient’s face to help him recover from fainting or dizziness.

Oxytropis – The leaves when crushed and boiled are good for bronchial troubles.

Pentstemon – Used for sores and burns, also for toothache. Internally it is used as a cathartic.

Pigweed (Chenopodium).

Pimple medicine – See Spurge.

Pinavene – As emetic.

Pine pitch – Placed in wounds as a disinfectant.

Plantain, common – Reputed to be a good diuretic and and useful in urinary difficulties.

Potentilla – Used (or mental trouble caused by “ghost” infections or bad dreams.

Redbud leaves – Used in the incense of the Mountain Chant.

Rhus toxicodendron – Mixed with deer’s blood and char-coal from a tree struck by lightning, it is used as an antiseptic against arrow poison.

Rose family plants – As emetics.

Rosin balls – Burned on hot embers and their fumes passed into the ear to cure deafness.

Sage – The white variety boiled with a pinch of salt is a very good remedy for hemoptysis. Wormwood sagebrush is made into liniment and spread over the wound.

Sego lily – Used as a narcotic, but of doubtful value.

Senecio – See Butterweeds.

Snake bite medicine – Milky sap of Euphorbia, Lactuca, or Sonchus asper and Fersera paniculata.

Spurge (Euphorbia Montana) – Made into a pimple medicine for acne.

Tobacco of the raven – Yellow just above the earth is used for sores caused by handling or burning a raven’s nest.

Yucca (soap weed) – Emulsion, prepared by pounding, is a cure for dandruff; also makes hair long, soft, and lustrous.

Whitlow grass – Made into a beverage and mixed with hummingbird food, it brings on diuresis in dropsy.

The medicine man uses most of the plants mentioned above in combinations. Such compounds really are “shot-gun medicines,” since they intend to cure many ills or symptoms all at one time. If one of the ingredients does not, it is hoped that another will. An example of this is “Life Medicine,” a universal tonic, especially good for indisposition and impaired vitality, sore muscles, sprains, bruises, fractures, pains, lameness. It is prepared from a large group of herbs: compositea, milfoil, plumed thistle, saw thistle, cudweed, rayless goldeurod, goose grass evening primrose, geranium, willow herb, meadow rue, yarrow, aster, cat-tail flag, sagebrush, and so forth.
Since some chants for the same patient last several days, the medicine man brings into use a large number of herbs for the same disease. He administers them singly or in combination. The following herbs are used in some of the better known chants: rattleweed, rockcress, and others in the Night Chant; Virginia creeper and others in the Mountain Chant; in the War Dance red cedar, yarrow, pinon leaves, and meadow rue are taken internally, while pennyroyal and another grass are chewed and spattered upon the patient; in the Lightning Chant lupine, rattleweed, and eriogona; in the Ant Witchcraft Chant Eriogonum and others; in the Coyote Chant peppermint, greasewood, wild cherry, and others.

Thus we see that the Navajo medicine man has drugs for the cure of practically every kind of illness: toothache, wounds and sores, boils, mouth sores, stiff joints, rheumatism, eyesores, syphilis, pruritus, snake bites, gout, headache, dandruff, stomach trouble, diarrhea, fainting, dizziness, bronchial troubles, pimples, ear troubles, deafness, hemoptysis, baldness, and dropsy; besides medicines used as cathartics, tonics, diuretics, emetics, contraceptives, aids to anesthesia and obstetrics.

The medicine man also has other uses besides the medicinal for his plants and flowers. Spruce twigs he makes into ceremonial collars, dresses, and hoops. Pine he uses for making ceremonial arrows; while its needles he pulverizes with other plants to make black paint with which he blackens the bodies of his singers. Oak twigs he uses at the cardinal points as signs of the dedication of a medicine lodge.

Red ocher is Child-of-the-water’s impersonation symbol. It is rubbed on the hair, as well as on the body. Ghosts are afraid of red ocher (Haile 1938b, pp. 177, 197, 318, 71n; 1943a, pp. 39, 40, 53, 96, 97).

Rockpiles (wayside altars) may sometimes be seen in isolated parts of the Navaho country. It is customary for passing travelers to add a rock to a rock heap and utter a prayer.

In the War Ceremony story, man-eating quadrupeds contested with man-eating flying creatures by piling up river boulders as they passed through a gap. The rocks left over from these piles became the prayer rockpiles of today; each rock represented a ghost overcome. Although these rocks were said to be river boulders, there is reason to believe that they are associated with flint (Reichard 1944b, p. 17; Haile 1938b, pp. 72-3, 97, 188-9; 1943a, p. 53; Matthews 1887, p. 415; Curtis folio, Pl. 30).

Rocks, all that remains of the monsters, have commemorative value, sometimes in the form of flint. Stones that have been struck by lightning, that bears have turned over, and upon which snake-shaped lichen grows are prescribed for the sweathouse fire of the War Ceremony.
Tiny smooth stones carried to the ground surface by ants are witch weapons of the Shooting Chant Evil.
Four small stones, gathered from the vicinity of Wren’s nest, were a part of the Hail Chant unraveling (Haile 1938b, p. 203; 1943a, p. 235; Reichard 1944d, p. 69).

Salt (‘a ci’) in food is supposed to furnish strength, perhaps against dangers, since it is not added to ceremonial mush whose purpose is identification. The Twins were fed on salty food by Salt Woman; she gave them salt as a weapon against Eye Killers. Apparently it had not attained its power in the first world, for when Water Sprinkler threw the salt given him by Salt Woman, it did no harm. The mush of the War Ceremony was salted to give power to the performers.
Salt Woman contributed salt from the lake near Zuni to the Hail Chant lotion, and later offered salt as a food gift (Stephen 1930, p. 92; Haile 1938b, pp. 63, 191; Reichard 1944b, pp. 73, 83; Hill 1940a).

Smoke is associated with creation, clouds, war, power, and purification. According to JS, Earth Woman and Sky Man smoked to bring about creation: “The de’nalye prayers were called ‘way on top’ because they gave off smoke for creation and good health.”
When Rainboy first raced with Frog, the latter threw down a dark cloud so that Rainboy could not see where he was going; when it cleared, he found himself running in the wrong direction. Heat laid a smokescreen of Darkness to help a war party. The origin of the smoke is not explained in any of the cases cited (Darkness, Frogs, Winter Thunder, Con. A; Incense, Con. B; Reichard 1944d, pp.23-S; Goddard, p.176).

Soot (te’c), though called ‘charcoal ‘ by others, seems a better name, since it is the fine powdered residue of burning. The following are explanations of soot: Spots made of ritualistically burned soot protect against dangers. The temples are blackened because they are the seat of ghosts. Black spots are put on the palms of Child-of-the-water’s impersonators because he held the dangerous monsters’ scalps. Collected soot (te’cigi’ and ‘altade’dli’c) represents, in the War Ceremony, vegetation and dark mist for the women and dark cloud for the men.
Soot is applied to the jaw in the War Ceremony (Blackening, Con. C; Kluckhohn-Wyman, pp. 55, 169, 239; Haile 1938b, pp. 169, 177, 237; 1943a, p. 52).

White clay (dle’c) was identified as montmorillonite in the Ganado region; other clays are used for whitening in other parts of the reservation, depending on the available deposits. Kluckhohn and Wyman found argillaceous sandstone (na’saladle’c) as the whitening medium in the regions where they worked.
Whitening or painting with white clay (‘adle’c) is a part of many ceremonies-figure painting, prayersticks, sandpaintings (Kluckhohn-Wyman, p. 72; Haile 1938b, pp. 177, 197, 201, 213; Matthews 1897, Pl. IV, VII).

Wood samples (tsintsosi) are symbols of the sweat-emetic rite, representing all fire wood. The wood is sometimes the same as that of emetic frames, pokers, hoops, and other properties.
Wood samples of the Shooting Chant sweat-emetic represent the trees against which Bear rubbed himself when Holy Man was seized by Thunder-aspen at the east, spruce at the south, red willow at the west, and chokecherry at the north (these were the materials and directional sequences of the emetic frames also).
The wood samples of the first day’s fire of the Hail Chant were oak for Dark Thunder’s side and hard scruboak for Winter Thunder’s. On the second day, Douglas fir represented both sides; on the third day, Dark Thunder’s people brought juniper, Winter Thunder’s pinion; and on the last day, Dark Thunder brought pinion and juniper, and Winter Thunder, spruce, Juniperus sibirica, gray willow, and blue willow.
On successive days Visionary of the Night Chant, burning down a tree from which to make his whirling log, made his fire of cottonwood, pinion, juniper, and spruce; according to Matthews, the woods for the fire to heat stones for the sweatbath were pinion and juniper only.
All warriors participated in the fire making of the War Ceremony, each being instructed to fetch wood wherever he could find it. They stacked it on a pile of rocks in preparation for Black God’s performance to drive off ghosts.
The fire-making ceremony that takes the place of the sweat-emetic rite in the Flint chant has as wood samples cedar, pinion, oak, scruboak, and various other woods (Kluckhohn-Wyman, p. 83; Matthews 1902, pp. 52, 172; Reichard 1944d, pp. 51, 57, 63, 71, 115; Haile 1938b, pp. 151, 169, 191; 1943a, p. 236).