This incredibly diverse compendium contains just about everything you'll ever need to know about the properties and provenance of herbs and spices of the world. From amara dulcis to yarrow, all-heal to viper's bugloss, Breverton's Complete Herbal is a modern day treasury of over 250 herbs and their uses. Terry Breverton provides a reworking of a Nicholas Culpeper classic text for a modern day audience. Arranged alphabetically, this book describes over 250 herbs and spices as well as feature entries on scented herb/medicinal gardens, the great herbalists and New World Herbs not included in Culpepper's original text. Each entry provides a description of the herb: its appearance and botanical features, a brief history of its uses in medicine, dyeing and cuisine to bizarre remedies and concoctions designed to get rid of all manner of real and imaginary ailments.

Culinary herbs and spices have been recognised globally for their dietary and medicinal uses for centuries. A growing body of research is acknowledging their health-promoting properties as well as their therapeutic potential with reference to a number of chronic non-communicable diseases including cancer and type 2 diabetes. The aim of this book is to bring together current knowledge of thirty of the most commonly used culinary herbs and spices globally in an accessible dictionary format. For each culinary herb or spice the following is covered: origin and history of use, including their use in food preservation and for medicinal purposes; nutritional composition; chemistry; sensory properties; adulteration; current and emerging research concerning their bioactive properties and their health promoting and therapeutic potential; safety; and adverse effects. The book is a central source of information for those who have a general interest in these foods, are studying plant and food science and nutrition, and who practice or have an interest in the culinary arts.

A compendium of facts, myths, and surprising secrets of the most infamous British royal family

This book examines the health/fitness interaction in an historical context. Beginning in primitive hunter-gatherer communities, where survival required adequate physical activity, it goes on to consider changes in health and physical activity at subsequent stages in the evolution of “civilization.” It focuses on the health impacts of a growing understanding of medicine and physiology, and the emergence of a middle-class with the time and money to choose between active and passive leisure pursuits. The book reflects on urbanization and industrialization in relation to the need for public health measures, and the ever-diminishing physical demands of the work-place. It then evaluates the attitudes of prelates, politicians, philosophers and teachers at each stage of the process. Finally, the book explores professional and governmental initiatives to increase public involvement in active leisure through various school, worksite, recreational and sports programmes.