Native American Ethnobotany (Daniel E. Moerman)
5
This is a big, solid hardcover volume that should be part of every library and university collection's plant and/or Native American reference sections. It is the absolute most thorough and comprehensive book on the subject, with cross-indexing and various ways to find the information you are looking for. I have an M.A. in Anthropology and am Native American myself (Ioway) and this book is an indispensable part of my personal library for both academic and personal use.
It is broken down into several sections, after the preface and acknowledgements.
"Plant Use by Native Americans" (pp. 11-28) gives overviews on the use of plants for drugs (medicines), foods, fibers and dyes, and other uses (hunting and fishing supplies (rods, lines, lures, traps, bows, arrows, spears, etc.), incense and fragrances, fuels, tools, and other uses. Interesting facts emerge such as more tribes used chokecherry as food (163 tribes) than corn (121 tribes), and the plant with the most medicinal uses was the common yarrow (355 uses)! The usages section covers the various sources of information and gives a list of the tribes and their locations.
"Organization of the Information" (pp. 29-32) discusses some of the issues involving the scientific and common plant names, both of which have varied over time and region, as well as ethnobotanical information.
The "Catalog of Plants" is the biggest part of the book (pp. 33-614), and it is arranged alphabetically by genus, with sublistings and specifics under the species. Then under each species, the use/s is/are given, as well as the tribe(s) which use it in those ways. For example, the chokecherry (Prunus virginiana) covers 4 pages in small print (pp. 444-448) of its many uses and the tribes across the U.S. who used it. After each use and tribe, the reference number in the original source is given. One example for chokecherry: "Cheyenne - Antidiarrheal - Unripened berries pulverized and used for diarrhea. (82:42)." Turning to the Bibliography, we find #82 is Jeff Hart's _Montana Plants and Early Peoples_, and checking page 42 of that book (which I also own and recommend) we find the passage there.
After the catalog of plants, there are sections on notes for certain entries, the bibliography of 206 sources, and FOUR useful indexes: two plant usage indexes (index of tribes and index of usages) and two plant name indexes (index of synonyms and index of common names).
The downsides? The print is fairly small, though the decent print quality makes it okay to read for my almost-50 year old eyes. If you are looking to learn how to identify plants, this is NOT the book to buy for that purpose. There are no photos or illustrations in this book. It is not a book that gives specifics on how the plants are mixed, gathered, applied, etc. For example, a plant's effectiveness is often tied to ceremonial and religious aspects that are not covered. There are details that can heal or harm if not absolutely correctly used that are not given. You need to buy field guides and plant keys for the area you are interested in to visually identify plants.
However, if you know the plants you are studying, and wish to have an encyclopedia-type reference to their uses in the various American Indian tribes and nations, you need this book. It's a little spendy because it is so big and is a hardcover, but I haven't regretted buying it and have used it often. It is really a lifetime reference source.