Page 16 - St Giles Catesby booklet MC StG 20210723 e-flip_Neat
P. 16
Hercules' club
This plant, a shrub or small tree found in sandy places near the coast
of South Carolina and other southeastern states, provided in former
centuries a home-remedy for toothache – chewing the bark will numb
the pain. Mark Catesby knew this, perhaps from personal experience.
Shortly after he arrived in South Carolina in 1722 he had a severe
infection of his cheek which became badly swollen. He was treated by
an incompetent surgeon who lanced the cheek twice without much
relief to the patient – it is not hard to imagine that Catesby asking to
chew some of this plant's bark to help alleviate the agony during his
three months confined to bed.
In his book, he depicted the common ground-dove (Columbina
passerina), the smallest of the North American doves, in the same
engraving, another example of his acuity in noticing relationships
between plants and animals in the wild. The ground-dove, he noted,
feeds on the berries of the Hercules' club with the result that its flesh Mark Catesby, 1730. The natural history of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama islands,
had an "aromatic flavour". volume 1, plate 26.
Hercules' club (Zanthoxylum clava-herculis) and ground dove (Columbina passerina)
