Descriptive study of contemporary status of the traditional knowledge on medicinal plants in Bulgaria

Abstract

In the contemporary reality of globalization and urbanization in Bulgaria, traditional empiric ethnobotanical knowledge is disappearing. The aim of our study was to check the attitude of a random sample of people to the herbs and the traditional way of healing: 1) to find out which herbs are the most popular in Bulgaria; 2) what is their most popular application; 3) to study the distribution of negative or positive attitudes to the traditional use of medicinal plants according to age and gender of Bulgarian people. In total, 77 plant species (including the ones in the formula combinations) were mentioned during the study. They belong to 38 families. The most important families are Lamiaceae, Rosaceae, Asteraceae and the plants which most commonly referred to as "Granny's cure" were Hypericum perforatum, Cotinus coggigria, Plantago major, Sempervivum sp. div., Calendula officinalis, Melissa officinalis, Allium sativum, Aesculus hippocastanum, Matricaria chamomilla and Cornus mass. The greatest number of herbs were the ones used to treat disorders of central nervous system (CNS), bones, skin, gastro-intestinal and respiratory system.

An ethnobotanical survey of traditionally used plants on Suva planina mountain (south-eastern Serbia)

“…Besides these few common species, however, there are many examples of medicinal plants being used in very distinct ways in different regions -even in areas sharing similar flora, but a different cultural or linguistic heritage (Quave et al, 2012). Through a comparative analysis of data on the use of plants for medical purposes in the research area and published data from neighbouring regions in the Western Balkans (Redžić, 2007;Jarić et al, 2007;Menković et al, 2011;Pieroni et al, 2011;Mustafa et al, 2012aMustafa et al, , 2012bŠavikin et al, 2013;Zlatković et al, 2014;Rexhepi et al, 2013;Kozuharova et al, 2013), we noted that the Suva planina region is most similar to Bosnia and Herzegovina (40.9%) and Bulgaria (40.6%), while within Serbia it shares the greatest similarities with the Zlatibor district (37.2%) and Kopaonik Mt. (32.3%) (Fig.…”

“…In addition to the specific geographical position and the high biological diversity, the solid knowledge of ethnobotany and ethnomedicine in rural parts of Serbia is greatly influenced by ethnic and cultural differences (Jarić, 2014a). In the mountainous regions of the Western Balkans, including Serbia, several ethnobotanical research studies have been undertaken in the past few years with the aim of identifying those medicinal plants growing in the wild and of gaining as thorough an understanding of traditional phytotherapy and customs as possible (Jarić et al, 2007(Jarić et al, , 2011(Jarić et al, , 2014a(Jarić et al, , 2014bRedžić, 2007;Pieroni, 2008;Šarić-Kundalić et al, 2010Šarić-Kundalić et al, , 2011Pieroni et al, 2011;Menković et al, 2011;Mustafa et al, 2012aMustafa et al, , 2012bŠavikin et al, 2013;Zlatković et al, 2014;Kozuharova et al, 2013;Ivancheva and Stantcheva, 2000). Such studies play an important role in preserving traditional phytotherapeutic knowledge, which is at risk of being lost in the future.…”

Ethnobotanical records of not yet documented therapeutic effects of some popular Bulgarian medicinal plants

“…div., Calendula officinalis, Melissa officinalis, Allium sativum, Aesculus hippocastanum, Matricaria chamomilla and Cornus mass. The great number of herbs is used to treat disorders of CNS (Central Nervous System), bones, skin, gastro-intestinal and respiratory system -details are provided in other paper of ours (Kozuharova et al, 2013). In this paper we emphasize on data for remedial properties which we found apparently new or as yet not documented in the literature for generally acknowledged medicinal plants.…”

“…The detailed results of the analysis are published elsewhere (Kozuharova et al, 2013). Here we summarize and emphasize some of our new findings concerning the therapeutic effect that are not documented yet in the scientific literature dealing with Bulgarian official or folk medicine application of plants.…”

Historical ethnobotanical review of medicinal plants used to treat children diseases in Romania (1860s–1970s)

“…Moreover, the majority of the available European ethnopharmacological field studies only contain isolated references to the medicinal plant use in children diseases, as they are not exclusively focused on traditional ethnopediatry, but rather on adult ethnomedicine. There are such isolated mentions on the traditional indications of medicinal plants in children in various European countries, in cases of digestive diseases [26,[49][50][51][52][53][54][55][56][57][58][59], bedwetting [25], respiratory diseases [55,[60][61][62][63][64], insomnia [52,63], and growth delay [46,65]. Nevertheless, more and more scientists try to gather and systematize the available world clinical data on the safety and efficacy of various herbal medicines in children [66][67][68][69][70][71].…”