Child hygiene among the American Indians : a chapter in early American pediatrics / Samuel X. Radbill.

  • Samuel X. Radbill
Date:
[1945]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Child hygiene among the American Indians : a chapter in early American pediatrics / Samuel X. Radbill. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    [Reprinted from Texas Reports on Biology and Medicine, Volume 3, Number 4, pages 419-512, Winter, 1945] CHILD HYGIENE AMONG THE AMERICAN INDIANS: A Chapter in Early American Pediatrics Samuel X. Radbill* When one of the primitive inhabitants of this continent took sick or was ailing or injured, there were many and diverse resources to which he could turn for aid and comfort. The old women of the tribe, with their traditional lore handed down by word of mouth through the years of trials and tribu¬ lations, were called upon for aid and advice. Then there were medicine men and shamans available when more erudite help was required or desired. According to Sahagun, the tlamat- quiticitl gave advice and care in labor and in the management of infants among the ancient Aztecs of Mexico. As usual with all primeval races, religion and superstition played a large part in the healing ritual, yet much was based upon the empiric knowledge gained by generations of trial and error, the memory of which became engrafted on the phylogenetic mind. The skill of the American Indians in preparing and administering herbs is traditional. Right here in my native city Indian herb doctors still ply their trade, strings of dusty, drying plants prominently displayed in windows and hanging from various points of view. When a child was sick the Indians invoked the same measures as a rule as were generally used for the grownup: herbs, “simples,” as they were apt to be called by the early colonists, sweat baths, depletives in the form of emetics, purges, venesection, scarification, sucking, a very common pro¬ cedure widely used among the American aboriginals of both hemispheres and curiously akin to cupping so popular the world over, and to leeching, too, since the sucking often was continued until blood was drawn. Sacrifices to the spirits of evil for appeasement, or to the benevolent spirits in supplication, and offerings to the various deities differed only in detail but * Assisted in part by the facilities of the Libraries of the University of Pennsylvania and The University of Texas Medical Branch. Address: 7043 Elmwood Ave., Philadelphia, Pa.