Garden Cucumber, Medicinal Plant, 1737
A Curious Herbal, Plate 4. Cucumber seed was used for "the stone, strangury (painful urination), heat of urine, burning fevers, and plurisies." The garden cucumber (Cucumis sativus) is a widely cultivated plant in the gourd family Cucurbitaceae. In Western folk medicine, cucumber is considered a diuretic and a laxative. Externally the juice is said to be good for soothing skin inflammations, burns, and irritations, and for treating freckles and wrinkles. Elizabeth Blackwell (1707-1758) was a famed Scottish illustrator and author who was best known as both the artist and engraver for the plates of "A Curious Herbal" (1737). A herbal is a book of plants, describing their appearance, their properties and how they may be used for preparing ointments and medicines. The book is notable both for its beautiful illustrations of medicinal plants and for the unusual circumstances of its creation. Blackwell undertook the project to raise money to pay her husband's debts and release him from debtor's prison. She drew, engraved, and colored the illustrations herself, mostly using plant specimens from the Chelsea Physic Garden in London. It was an artistic, scientific and commercial enterprise unprecedented for a woman of her time. Little is known of her later years. She died in 1758, at the age of 50 or 51. She remained loyal to Alexander throughout, even sharing royalties with him from the sale of additional book rights.
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