Nicolas Monardes

Okay, the quote in the title isn’t a direct quote…probably. Before we get to all that let’s get some background on the guy.

Nicolas Monardes was born in Seville, Spain 1493 or 1508…the jury’s still out on his DOB with the 1493 date being taken from something he said, and 1508 which some scholars have come up with because (from what I gather) 1493 would mean he was a late bloomer not graduating from University of Alcala in 1530 in his 30s, not marrying until his 40s (which wasn’t totally acceptable), and not writing his renowned books until his 70s.

Monardes got a degree in art and then medicine. He began a medical practice in Seville and eventually earned a doctorate in medicine which gave him a high position opening up his world to the plants that might have medicinal qualities that were making their way from across the Atlantic. Here’s the thing–he didn’t acquire the plants himself because he never set foot in the Americas. He traded for them. Often he exchanged cloth and people for his plants. Black people specifically. I’m just putting it out there since most write-ups about him only mention the cloth part.

Monardes would become the first to introduce many of the New World plants to Europe through his written chronicles in Historia medicinal de las cosas que se traen de nuestras Indias Occidentales . A little side story–The English edition of Joyful News out of the New Found World was translated by John Frampton who had been imprisoned and tortured in Spain since the Great Inquisition was still all the rage. Frampton managed to escape and sought sweet revenge first as a privateer raiding Spanish interests and then as a translator of Spanish books where he managed to make them have an anti-Spanish tone to stir up the English by pointing to the riches Spain was getting out of the new lands across the ocean.

Anyway, back to the fantastic medical plants Monardes trafficked humans for (I’m just putting it out there). They included things like sunflowers, peppers, and tobacco which he believed could cure or alleviate at least 65 ailments and diseases including cancer, kidney stones, rheumatism, constipation, toothaches, intestinal worms, child labor pains, and many many more. He also wrote that sassafras cured some of the same diseases as tobacco plus syphilis, arthritis, depression, weight gain, malaria, dysentery, edema, etc. etc.

He died in 1588.

So there you have it, the guy Bee Balm (monarda) was named after. Nicolas Bautista Monardes introduced Europe to many plants from the Americas, contributed to the weird world of medicine of 16th-century Europe, and traded people for plants–again…I’m just putting it out there.