Since then, the best essential oils for healing have become a staple in alternative medicine across the world.

Jean Valet used the best essential oils to treat injured soldiers in the second world war, and this led to Marguerite Maury being the first person to “individually prescribe” an essential oils healing combination using a Tibetan technique for back massage that treated nerve endings along the spine. Although he wasn’t necessarily a natural health advocate, he became interested in essential oils after a 1910 accident where he badly burned his hand, and used the first available salve in his laboratory: a pure, undiluted lavender oil compound that not only immediately eased the pain, but healed his injury without infection or scar.īecause of Gattefosse’s work, Dr. What we know as modern “aromatherapy” was not introduced formally until French chemist Rene Maurice Gattefosse first coined the phrase in 1937. Thankfully, the Renaissance resurrected herbal medicine, and physicians such as Paracelsus challenged his medical colleagues with testimonials of successful treating life-threatening concerns like leprosy. Unfortunately, folk medicine was viewed as “witchcraft,” and many herbalists were either burned at the stake or persecuted. Little did they know that their perfume was also helping stave off sickness and disease!ĭuring this era, it is believed that Monks continued the healing tradition of using the best essential oils and secretly kept herbal medicine alive in the halls of their monasteries. However, because the Catholic Church viewed bathing as sin, high esteem was given to aromatics – which coincidentally are also antibacterial – to keep foul odor at bay. Sadly, the Dark Ages brought with it a disdain for Hippocrates’ holistic approach. After the fall of the Roman Empire, Persia picked up these healing techniques and perfected the essential oil distillation process. Somewhere in the midst of this knowledge transfer, China and India also started to employ herbal remedies, and Ayurvedic medicine embraced essential oils extensively.Īs civilizations transferred world power, the technique of using the best essential oils for healing from Greece traveled to Rome, who favored aromatherapy and fragrances. This wisdom sailed across the Mediterranean and evidently reached Hippocrates, who utilized aromatherapy to enhance massage techniques a few centuries before the coming of Christ. However, they definitely lacked the medicinal strength of the best essential oils that we use today.īe that as it may, a vital component of ancient culture spanning at least 3,000 years, it appears that essential oils were enjoyed by those in ancient Cyprus, Egypt and Pompeii who first made extensive use of herbs with distillation methods dating back 3,500 B.C. They all contained essential oils and were, thus, very effective at preventing and managing disease.

The same is true with extracts, salves, and poultices that were made from healing plants. To be fair, ancient civilizations did employ crude distillation techniques, but the essential oils that were extracted centuries ago were a far cry from the potent, filtered, and pure compounds that we see available to us today. Extracted directly from the bark, flower fruit, leaves, nut, resin, or root of a plant or tree, and just one drop can provide the amazing health benefits that each oil provides. Truth be told, the best essential oils as we know them today are very new on the scene of plant-based therapies. Uses & Applications of Healing Essential OilsĮssential Oils for Healing Through History.Essential Oils for Healing Through History.

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