Potions have long been a part of the insomniac’s medicine cabinet. Tinctures made from valerian root, mandrake root, and lettuce seeds are a few of the helpful but generally innocuous variety, while the Middle Ages prescription of “drinking a potion made from the gall of a castrated boar” is perhaps a bit extreme. The castrated boar juice was included in a concoction to put out patients about to undergo surgery in the Middle Ages as well.
In the Victorian era, people tended to be interested in spiritualist theories, including those involving magnetic fields and their impact on human health. Charles Dickens, who suffered from insomnia and for a time, tried a combination of opium and alcohol that left him with a wicked hangover, ultimately found relief after placing the head of his bed due north.
An old natural Victorian cure for insomnia from 1890 claims if you follow the procedure below you will be asleep in no time!
1) Chafe the body and extremities with a brush or towel, or rub smartly with the hands, to promote circulation and withdraw the excessive amount of blood from the brain. You will fall asleep in a few moments.
OR
2) On retiring to bed, eat three of four small onions. They will act as a gentle and soothing narcotic and you will be drifting off to slumberland posthaste.
I read an excerpt in an old book that read:
Soap your head with ordinary yellow soap; rub it into the roots of the hair until your head is just lather all over, tie it up in a napkin, go to bed, and wash it out in the morning. Do this for a fortnight. Take no tea after 6pm. I did this, and have never been troubled with sleeplessness since.
Curious indeed and personally I think it was not drinking the tea before bedtime that assisted this insomniac in slumber.
I think I will stick to a relaxing herbal tea to help me drift off.
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