A Most Excellent Lotion or Washing Water

which Fasteneth the Teeth and Softeneth the Hands

English, 1597

 

Period recipe books are full of interesting tooth remedies.  While most of the recopies have horrible abrasives in them such as ground sand, rocks, gems, snail shells, or cuttlefish bones, other ingredients such as honey might actually make your children want to brush…or at least try once.

Modern people might think that the only recourse medieval and renaissance man had to prevent or remedy tooth decay was praying to St. Appolonia and chewing on a stick.  Not so.  The causes of tooth decay were well known by the sixteenth century.  Advances such as fillings, prosthetic teeth, and false teeth had been made. The French surgeon, Guy de Chauliac (1300-1368) wrote in his Chirurgia magna (1363) that foods should not be eaten at extreme temperatures, break things with your teeth or eat sweets.  He also wrote that the teeth should be cleaned frequently and gently, making sure that no food remained between the teeth.  He recommended rinsing the teeth with wine or wine with pepper and mint as well as dentifrices. [1]  A dentifrice is simply an abrasive substance.

In the fifteenth century, Johannes Arculanus devised the following rules for dental heath:

1. Easily corruptible food must not be partaken of (milk, salt fish)
2. Foods which induce vomiting should be avoided
3. Sweet foods are forbidden
4. Do not break hard things with the teeth
5. Do not alternate hot and cold foods
6.  (omitted from my book?)
7. Avoid leeks, which are injurious to the teeth
8. Clean teeth immediately after meals with a toothpick
9. After picking, rinse with wine and sage or wine, mastich, gallia, moschata, cubeb, jubiper seeds, root of cyperus, and rosemary leaves.
10. The teeth must be rubbed with a dentifrice before bed or in the morning.[2]

 

Queen Elizabeth's accounts show that she had several 'tooth cloths', although there is no documentation of cleaning her teeth.  She was very fond of sweets and known for her bad teeth.[3]

The Receipts:

 Nostradamus gives us a recipe in 1552:

Take three drachms each of crystal, flint, white marble, glass and calcined rock salt, two drachms each of calcined cuttlefish bone and small sea-snail shells, half a portion each of pearls and fragments of gemstones, two drachms of the small white stones which are to be found in running water, a scruple of amber and twenty-two grains of musk.  Mix them well together and grind them into the finest powder on a marble slab. Rub the teeth with it frequently and, if the gums have receded, paint a little rose honey on them. The flesh will grow back in a few days and the teeth will be perfectly white.[4]

Here is a recipe by Sir Hugh Plat, from 1609. 

Take a quart of hony, as much Vinegar, and halfe so much white wine, boyle them together and wash your teeth therwith now and then.[5]"

The item which I have chosen to make is described in John Gerard's The Herball or General Historie of Plantes[6] (England, 1597) thusly:

[Raspis…]

The leaves of the Bramble boyled in water, with honey, alum, and a little white wine added thereto, make a most excellent lotion or washing water, and the same decoction fasteneth the teeth.

My redaction of the recipe:

Raspberry Leaves – Rubus fructicosus
Honey
Alum
White Wine.

I infused the dried, foraged raspberry leaves in a cup of boiling water to which I added a cup of honey, from bees kept by a local SCA member.  I then added a fair amount of Alum, which is very tangy.  I stopped adding the alum when the tang was almost too strong to bear.  Then, I added a quarter cup of hard cider (which I brewed). 

While Gerard does not give proportions for his ingredients, Sir Hugh Plat does. I followed Sir Hugh's proportions between liquid and honey as a general guide.  I chose to use hard cider instead of white wine because I had home-brewed cider on hand and wanted the recipe to be as period as possible (most white wines have sulfides in them).

I have tested this.  I put some of this lotion on the backs of my hands and rub it in until it begins to "stick".  Then, I rinse off my hands and dry them on a towel.  Immediately afterwards, and for a few hours, my hands are noticeably softer.  I have obtained the same results on my face.  I had suspected that perhaps I would not appreciate the effects upon my teeth, however, I tried brushing my teeth with nothing and compared it to the results from brushing with this lotion.  I found that I felt much fresher after brushing with the lotion than without.

Although this value of this recipe seems a bit far-fetched, Raspberry and Blackberry leaves and Alum both have highly astringic qualities.  I recently visited the dentist for a cleaning and told her about this recipe and asked her about the validity of my experiment…She was fascinated, and told me that she regularly directs her patients with gum problems to brush their gums with a  mixture of salt and alum.  She did suggest that perhaps I should add a few drops of fluoride to the lotion and find something other than honey to use as a base.

Bibliography

Anderson, Frank J.  An Illustrated History of the Herbals.  Columbia University Press, New York.  1977

Arnold, Janet.  Queen Elizabeth's Wardrobe Unlock'd.  Maney, London, 1988

Bayard, Tania.  Medieval Home Companion.  Harper, New York.  1991.

Boeser, Knut.  The Elixirs of Nostradamus: Nostradamus' original recipes for elixirs, scented water, beauty potions and sweetmeats [1552].  Moyer Bell.  London, 1994.

Collins, Minta.  Medieval Herbals.  The Illusrative Traditions. The British Library and Univerity of Toronto Press.  2000

Gjerde, Mary.  Organic Makeup, the Natural way to Beauty.  Tandem, London, 1971

Plat, Sir Hugh. "Delightes for Ladies, to adorne their Persons, Tables, Closets, and Distillatories: with beauties, bouquets, perfumes & waters." London 1609. Introduction by G. E. Fussell, and Kathleen Rosemary Fussell. Crosby Lockwood & son ltd:  London, 1948

Rohde, Eleanour Sinclair.  A Garden of Herbs.  Dover Publications, Inc. New York, 1969

Walsh, James J (M.D).  Medieval Medicine.  A&C Black, London: 1920.

Woodward, Marcus, ed.  Leaves from Gerard's Herball.  New York:  Dover Publications: