What’s an asafidity bag? Variously spelled asfidity, asfedity, asafetida, asphidity, and assafedity, it’s a folk medicine tradition involves putting the stinky resin of the asafetida or asafoetida plant in a small bag worn around the neck to ward off disease.
What is an asafidity bag?
What’s an asafidity bag? Variously spelled asfidity, asfedity, asafetida, asphidity, and assafedity, it’s a folk medicine tradition involves putting the stinky resin of the asafetida or asafoetida plant in a small bag worn around the neck to ward off disease.
What are asphidity bags and how do they work?
To ward off the flu virus, polio and, other diseases, people used folk medicine remedies, and medicine bags pinned to their under garments called Asphidity bags (that is what my Great Aunt Hattie called her medicine bag). Asphidity bags were filled with herbs, and concoctions worn to ward off these maladies.
Why do babies wear acifidity bags?
Babies and school-aged children were forced to wear acifidity bags during outbreaks of polio, measles, and during the winter to stave off influenza. What is Asafoetida? Asafoetida is a resin derived from the four-year-old roots of the Ferula asafoetida plant, a member of the fennel species.
Why do pharmacies cover your neck with acifidity bags?
The putrid smelling spice was stocked by pharmacies to be draped around the neck inside acifidity bags in an attempt to deflect the deadly strain of influenza.
Description
Have you ever heard of an acifidity bag? I never did. Until one evening a few months ago when my 85 year-old uncle was telling me a story. He was remembering when he was cleaning out his grandparents' bedroom and he found an "acifidity" bag under the leg of their bed.
Shipping and return policies
Etsy offsets carbon emissions from shipping and packaging on this purchase.
What are asphidity bags?
Asphidity bags were filled with herbs, and concoctions worn to ward off these maladies.
What does "dulcify" mean?
Dulcis: dulcify, meaning: 1. To make sweet, 2. To make agreeable, MOLLIFY
What is Asafoetida used for?
Asafoetida is used as remedy for a number digestive and respiratory ailments throughout North Africa. This African connection strongly suggest that this piece of folk medicine was brought to the South by enslaved Africans and spread across the entire region.
Do people swear by a bag?
Though, like many folk medicine traditions, use of the bags has declined in recent years, there are still people out there who will swear by them. There are also those who remember a cold being made better, or perhaps worse, having a grandmother hang a particularly smelly bag around their neck.
