Treatment with herbs is based upon ancient oral tradition and has always been closely linked to the supernatural, the magical and the mystical. Milleniums ago numerous medicinal herbs and spices used to be carried following trade routes between Europe, the Middle East, India and the rest of Asia. In the time period between the 12th and 18th Century European herbalists acquired a great number of medicinal herbs from all over the world, thus supplementing the already vast number of European herbs. In the country it was mostly women who used to pick medicinal herbs to treat a wide variety of ailments. The Prekmurje folk medicine features over 500 medicinal herbs to treat inner and outer ailments and illnesses. There have, however, never been special vessels or devices for picking and drying medicinal herbs. In the region of Prekmurje the Feast of the Assumption (15th August) is also known as Benediction of herbs and it is on the said day that people take a bouquet of garden flowers or field flowers to church to be blessed.

Woman With Picked Medicinal Herbs, Turnišče, 1956

Drying of Collected Herbs, Bakovci, 1983

Pharmacology

The first European pharmacies were introduced in the 15th Century; in the 16th and 17th Century there used to be monastic pharmacies, as well as household pharmacies and public pharmacies. Household pharmacies and castle pharmacies were of grave importance in cases where castles were far away from towns with a doctor and a pharmacy. During the Middle Ages and up to 1859 pharmacists used to be trained as tradesmen, very much like apprentices and mates in various guilds, in that pharmacists were trained unter the supervision of doctors. The first pharmacies in the region of Prekmurje were introduced at Radgona (1566), Lendava (1835), Murska Sobota (1842), Ljutomer (1878), Beltinci (1889) and Grad (1911). Wooden, porcelain, ceramic and glass vessels and containers of various shapes were used to store drugs and medicines.

Bölcs Pharmacy, Murska Sobota, Late 19th Century

Pharmacy, Beltinci, Late 20th Century