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<p>Medicinal plants are an understudied subset of the archaeobotanical record due to well-known challenges ranging from context to the guarding of specialized knowledge. This article moves away from individual uses of plants to instead investigate the practices surrounding their collection, thereby detailing landscape management, scales of engagement, and the political nature of healing. Here I examine historical medicinal-plant collection practices as recorded by Huron Smith in 1923 at the Menominee Reservation in northern Wisconsin, U.S.A., and map the 377 herbarium specimens he collected. The findings demonstrate the importance of medicinal-plant collection for broader understandings of plant collection practices by expanding&#xa0;conceptions of resource areas and highlighting the ways selective&#xa0;and sometimes-guarded actions shape spaces. Further, the data illustrate how Menominee healers in the early 20th century maintained localized landscape knowledge and possible management of spaces within ancestral territory. Results demonstrate the value of legacy herbarium data sets as a means to access medicinal-plant collection. Overall, findings highlight the centrality of medicinal plants to archaeobotanical analyses.</p>

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“All Plants Are Medicine”: Historical Menominee Medicinal-Plant Collection Practices, Wisconsin, U.S.A.

  • 期刊论文

  • 发表日期：

    2025年6月1日

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  • Madeleine McLeester

摘要

Medicinal plants are an understudied subset of the archaeobotanical record due to well-known challenges ranging from context to the guarding of specialized knowledge. This article moves away from individual uses of plants to instead investigate the practices surrounding their collection, thereby detailing landscape management, scales of engagement, and the political nature of healing. Here I examine historical medicinal-plant collection practices as recorded by Huron Smith in 1923 at the Menominee Reservation in northern Wisconsin, U.S.A., and map the 377 herbarium specimens he collected. The findings demonstrate the importance of medicinal-plant collection for broader understandings of plant collection practices by expanding conceptions of resource areas and highlighting the ways selective and sometimes-guarded actions shape spaces. Further, the data illustrate how Menominee healers in the early 20th century maintained localized landscape knowledge and possible management of spaces within ancestral territory. Results demonstrate the value of legacy herbarium data sets as a means to access medicinal-plant collection. Overall, findings highlight the centrality of medicinal plants to archaeobotanical analyses.