Hmmm, Oak ... Kao ... koa ... oka .... okay Q, you may be right about the dates re the "toothache nails", I don't know. I didn't discuss the date with my dentist, either -- had a few other things on my mind, like pain!

But here's an article from the American Medical Association, describing a similiar, if slightly more bizarre remedy used by American pioneers on the Western frontier in the 1800's ...

"To cure a toothache, pick the tooth with a coffin nail, the middle toe of an owl, a needle used to make a shroud, or a splinter from a tree struck by lightening; apply the juice of the "toothache plant" (prickly ash), pack the tooth with cotton soaked in oil of cloves, rub it with sumac (poison oak) gum; then chew the root of a thistle." Egads!

And here's another reference, giving more info specifically about medicinal uses of oak in folklore, but again not mentioning specific dates.

"Folkloristic medicine made widespread use of various trees, not so much as remedies, but for the purpose of transferring the evil spirits of disease from the sufferer to a strong healthy tree, which seemed much better equipped to cope with it. The practice is known as 'transfer magic'. A variety of rituals were associated with this custom and all of them involved reciting certain spells, which caused the disease spirit to take leave from the body and take up residence with the tree.

Oaks, as the strongest of all the trees, were deemed effective against many different kinds of affliction, among them were gout, fever, toothache, headache and even broken bones. Sometimes bits of the sufferer's garment, some hair or fingernails were plugged into the tree with the help of nails (often coffin-nails), thereby banning the disease daemon into the wood."

Warning: the last article is by one of those "new-age" herbalists, though. No doubt some folk here will write it off as garbage on that basis alone.

I've got a few more references, but I'm sure they'll all be p'd upon anyway. So, I'm foaking off now. Please forward any complaints to my lawyer!

;>)   daylia