any southern posters ever heard of this folk remedy??

14 years ago

It's a little off-topic, but it DOES have to do with twigs and berries and so on and there's usually SOMEONE here who knows a thing or two...

A southern (Alabama) relative and I were talking about home remedies and wildcrafting/folk stuff the other day and he told me about this essential oil or some kind of extract they have down south that you can find in stores but which actually sounds to me like one of those terrifying home remedy things that the gypsy woman up in the holler gave you or that grandma made you smear on your chest so you can sniff the cureative (read "caustic") vapors. It is supposedly a mixture of sassafras root, camphor, turpentine (?!) some odd herbs, maybe some eucalyptus, and a few things he could not remember. Said it smelled so bad he believed you never got sick simply because no one--and therefore even the sick folks- would come near you. The trouble is he could pronouce it halfway decently but could not even begin to spell it and out of curiosity I would like to look it up if possible. He says it is called ( bear with me) assafinity, aphsinity asaphinity aphasinity or something along those lines. I really don't know if this is a label name or just something it's generally called.

ANd of course I have not ruled out the possibility that my southern relative is simply having some serious fun at the expense of his know-no-better Yankee cuzin (anything north of the Mason/Dixon rates you a Yankee I guess) and that there is no such thing. HOWEVER! I told HIM about some stuff we have in certain stores here called Monkey-Butt powder that was a novelty to him and highly intriguing so we have agreed to make a trade, a bottle of my Monkey-Butt for a can of his whatever-it-is.

So if any of you Dixie folks have any idea what he's talking about, kindly pass some info my way.

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Comments (8)

marlingardener
14 years ago
Why, honey, y'all are talking about an asaphoedita bag. Sure-fire cure for what ails ya. Children used to have an asaphoedita bag hung around their neck to ward off colds, chills, and the plague. Must have worked because a lot of children survived and we have a population explosion now!
It is pronounced (please excuse first syllable) Ass-a-fid-ah-tah. Every granny had her own "receipt" for the concoction that went into the bag, and it seems the ladies had a contest going on to see who could make up the worst smelling batch.
By the way, you are not a Yankee. I was born in S. Illinois and Yankees are from Chicago.
maifleur01
14 years ago
My mother wore one in Kansas during the 30's so not just a Southern thing. I recently saw seeds in the spice area of one of our local stores spelled the same way. Apparently used in some indian cooking.
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cjc45
14 years ago
I'm from south Texas and y'all are ALL yankees. The southern pronunciation is ever so slightly different: ass-a-FID-a-tee.
dirtgirl
Original Author
14 years ago
Well now I know he wasn't just having fun with me. He said they used to put it over wood shaving or what-have-you and hang it around the neck in a bag, or even simply soak a chunk of corncob with the stuff and then string that around your neck or tie to your person somewhere. He says there is a bottle of it in his garage and will send it up as soon as he gets back, which is pretty soon since he forgot and left a window open and there's storms coming in off the Gulf.

However, I have punched in just about every spelling I know and still come up emptyhanded on the web. Not even a stub on Wikipedia.

As far as the Yankee moniker goes, after spending many summers of my childhood with relatives in Hattiesburg, MS, Ozark, AL and other such southern locales, I used to think the Mason Dixon line was ground zero and anything from north of that was not to be trusted by good southern people (first cousins exempted). Since then, however, I have realized that it's more a mindset than a geographical location. And here in the good state of Illinois (if you leave out politics), from about Springfield south we tend to bristle when someone finds you are from the Land of Lincoln and immediately says "Chicago??" Might as well be its own commonwealth or something, it's so dissimilar. They refer to us as hicks and we call them Shikeegans.

Marlingardener...where at in S. Illinois?
christie_sw_mo
14 years ago
I hadn't heard of it but did some googling. Wikipedia spells it "Asafoetida" and has some info.

Here is a link that might be useful: Wikipedia - Asafoetida
marlingardener
14 years ago
Christie,
Thanks for the correct spelling! When I wrote the word, it didn't look right, but we're redecorating our study and I couldn't find my dictionary. Never thought of Wikipedia. I now have the correct spelling written down, and if I ever need to make an asafoetida bag, I can label it right! I should have known the "foetid" part was like "fetid", which makes a lot of sense.
dirtgirl
Original Author
14 years ago
I DO appreciate the input-- I knew I could get some answers here! Yes, Wikipedia is fantastic, and although I went there right away, I was not close enough with my spelling attempts and could only come up with an extinct ammonite, which I knew had to be wrong.
I can only asume that the practice we know here in America must have traveled here by way of the slaves/immigration as this is not a native plant. Of course, maybe over the years there were variations on a theme and we added our own local ingredients, though I wonder what could be found here that smells as bad. RIght now I've got a cluster of stinkhorns in the walkway that come to mind...
Regardless of how I might be assured of its efficacy, I refuse to hang ANYTHING around my neck whose nickname is "devil's s--t"!
Jerry Smith
4 years ago
Maybe you should try it. It might clear out some of the other stuff in your head.

any southern posters ever heard of this folk remedy??

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marlingardener

maifleur01

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any southern posters ever heard of this folk remedy??

Comments (8)

marlingardener

maifleur01

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cjc45

dirtgirlOriginal Author

christie_sw_mo

marlingardener

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