Tudor medicine, although based on the false assumption of ‘humours’ and with no understanding of germ theory, could nevertheless be surprisingly effective. A lot of modern medications are based on the chemical compounds of natural remedies available to the Tudors — such as clove oil.
I got to learn about the efficacy of clove oil firsthand. Thanks to persistent vomiting for 28 weeks during my pregnancy with Blossom, the enamel weakened on one of my back molars and I got a cavity. Since we were broke with no dental insurance and no way to pay the co-pay on dental insurance, this cavity ran amok for a couple of years while I — like many Americans — toughed it out. Once insured, I went to the dentist, where I discovered that it wasn’t a drill-n-fill issue anymore. I needed a crown.
The crown worked fine for a few years. Unfortunately, I am a bruxer (I grit my teeth while asleep) so my crown finally broke. The dentist said there was only a bit of the crown broken off the edge and it was still protecting the tooth, and that we could wait awhile before I needed another crown. However, I knew that crowns eventually became root canals, post and core, and other things I would rather not have to do. Thus, I told my dentist that I would prefer to have the tooth extracted. It wouldn’t effect my ability to chew, nor was the gap visible no matter how widely I smiled. We could just treat it like a rouge 5th wisdom tooth and be done with it.
After consultation, it was decided that there was no reason to extract the tooth until it needed to be extracted. I was to contact the dentist when it started giving me trouble and he would give me a referral to a good local oral surgeon. What neither of us realised was that my tooth wouldn’t give me any indicator pangs – that it would shoot straight for searing, throbbing agony. Or that it would chose to do so on the weekend when the dentist office was closed.
The “discomfort” of the tooth was seriously “unpleasant” and over the counter pain medicines were not making it much better. I therefore went online to find out if there were any home remedies for toothache that might help me through the next 36 hours before I could throw myself on the mercy of the dentist, and the resounding answer to my query was to use clove oil to block tooth pain.
Turns out clove oil (called eugenol) is frequently used in professional dental treatments. The eugenol is a very effective topical analgesic/aesthetic and also has antiseptic qualities. A study in 2006 found clove oil to be as efficacious as benzocaine in numbing the gums of dental patients. It is frequently recommended to help with the pain from post-extraction dry socket. With a hopeful heart I read the instructions and tried the clove oil. It worked! The searing agony became a dull ache, which was infinitely more bearable.
Cloves were a popular spice and medicine from the time they were first introduced to Europe by Muslim merchants. Tudor physicians would recommend chewing cloves or applying powdered cloves to cure a toothache. Granted, the Tudor doctor thought that the “hotness” of the clove was killing the “worms” that caused toothache, but the treatment still worked. Just because they didn’t have the words “antiseptic” or “analgesic” didn’t mean they didn’t notice that cloves would ease the pain and sometimes even heal the abscessed tooth.
Although clove oil is wonderful, it must be said that I am glad I live in a time and place where I could be put completely under for the tooth extraction and then given hydrocodone afterwards. I must admit that hydrocodone is much more effective than clove oil at making pain go away. Of course, it also made my ability to stay awake go away too.
Moreover, I don’t think hydrocodone would be good in a pumpkin pie. The cloves win that one hands down.