十七世紀英格蘭對菸草藥用價值的理解與應用

The Understanding and Application of the Medicinal Value of Tobacco in Seventeenth-Century England

本研究欲掌握菸草融入英格蘭人生活的歷史脈絡，以及瞭解他們如何認知菸草的藥用價值。為此，本研究關注「英格蘭人如何開始認識菸草」、「菸草被用來處理哪些症狀」以及「哪些知識和經驗讓菸草不僅是一種異地植物，還是一種藥物」三項問題，以此論述菸草藥用價值的「傳入」與「應用」。此二者即是本研究的兩大主軸，前者處理英格蘭人對菸草藥用價值的發現、理解、接納與質疑，後者則探究菸草藥用價值在經歷學者討論、謠言流傳以及疫情之後呈現出的變化。英格蘭人因這些事件更加認識菸草，而這可能導致菸草消費量顯著增長；與此同時，菸草的藥用價值持續衰落，這很可能與醫學理論的典範轉移有關。

The aim of this study is to understand how tobacco was introduced into the daily lives of people in England, and how people understood the medicinal value of tabacco. The study focuses on the medicinal value of tobacco by investigating its transformation, from an American plant to a mythical panacea, and then, a preservative. This study shows that the understanding of tobacco in seventeenth-century England had been distinct from that of other European nations, which was because of the different species and usages of tobacco when it was initially introduced. Moreover, the medicinal value of tobacco had been intertwined with mythical narratives of it as a panacea and a traditional theory of medicine, that is, humourism. Thus, when a new theory challenged humourism, which was the basis that had supported the medicinal value of tobacco, the medicinal value of tobacco consequentially collapsed.