Chippewa Cold Remedies: Calamus Root as Snuff or Decoction, Sweetened Wild Onion for Children (Densmore, 1928)

Her table gives plant, part, preparation and use; no amounts. Recorded use, not medical advice.

Pulverise dried calamus root and snuff it up the nostrils. Densmore also lists calamus for toothache, sore throat and as a physic. Ours: calamus is barred from food in the US (21 CFR 189.110).

Boil the root in water (amounts not given) and drink it.

Make a decoction of the root of wild onion (Allium stellatum) and sweeten it. Used chiefly for children. Ours: maple sugar as the sweetener, the Chippewa sugar.

From Frances Densmore, *Uses of Plants by the Chippewa Indians*, **44th Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology** (1928), pp. 340-341 (checked on the archive.org scan usesofplantsbych00dens). Chippewa remedies were mostly knowledge of the Midewiwin, shared with her so a record would survive. A weak dogbane decoction for infants in the same rows is left out on purpose: dogbane is toxic. Amounts, sweetener and safety lines are ours. Recorded use, not medical advice.