Ethnomedicinal remedies among the ancient and modern Maya

For millennia various Maya groups have used and developed their knowledge of botanicals as ways of curing illness and improving general health. Many plants in their ethnopharmacological inventory can indeed be shown to have active principles that address many of the illness for which they are used by the Maya. A second category of plants, however, are used to cure “spiritual” sicknesses, i.e., those linked to mythological origins and Maya cosmovision and not to specific therapeutic qualities of the plant. In this presentation, I discuss ethnobotanical data from my fieldwork in Ch’orti’, Mopan, Q’eqchi’, Chontal, Tz’utujil, and Lacandon Maya communities that analyses both types of illness. I will discuss medicinal plant use in general healing rites, with health issues specifically of women, and with snake bites. This presentation will attempt to provide detailed documentation of traditional ethnomedicines and practices from the dying art of traditional Maya healers involving multi-faceted diagnostic techniques to determine disease severity, the presence or absence of sorcery, and the appropriate botanical remedy.