AZTEC

The Aztecs may never have got round to inventing the wheel,
but they had an excellent remedy for a chronic cough,
just rediscovered by researchers at Imperial College, London.

While the cough reflex serves a useful purpose,
it can prove troublesome if persistent
- for which the only treatment may be to suppress it
with large doses of codeine.
Hence the interest last week in the new treatment,
theobromine, an ingredient of cocoa that turns out
to be considerably more effective,
without codeine side-effects of drowsiness and constipation.

The Aztecs would have known all this and more,
for the very high esteem in which they held the cocoa plant
for its many marvellous properties is
in its Latin name, Theobroma, 'the food of the gods,'
from which, of course, the term theobromine is derived.
When, in 1519, the Spanish conquistador
Hernán Cortés was first granted an audience
with the Aztec king Montezuma at his breakfast table,
he noted how his guards brought him,
in cups of pure gold, a drink made from the cocoa plant,
which he said he took before visiting his wives.

Soon after, the Jesuit Bernandino Sahagun,
who would spend 60 years collecting information
on every aspect of Aztec botanical knowledge,
listed among cocoa's medicinal properties
its value for those stricken with a cough.
As it seems the best to have taken part of 500 years
to discover what was common knowledge to the Aztecs,
it might be useful to investigate what else
this food of the gods might be good for.

Remedies rediscovered from centuries ago
can prove remarkably effective, writes Dr James Le Fanu.


CHOCOLATE
COCOA


Aztec Chocolate Lip Balm
Cocoa for Cough