Sumerians (2600–2100 BC) were actively utilizing the garlic healing qualities, and there is a belief that they brought the garlic to China, from where it was later spread to Japan and Korea.
The Ebers Codex, and Egyptian medical papyrus dating to about 1550 B.C.E. mentions garlic as an effective remedy for a variety of ailments.
In ancient Egypt, the workers who had to build the great pyramids were fed garlic daily, and the Bible mentions that the Hebrews enjoyed their food with garlic.
Garlic was used as performance enhancing agent in sports by original Olympic athletes in Ancient Greece.
Early men of medicine such as Hippocrates, Pliny and Aristotle espoused a number of therapeutic uses for this botanical.
In the Middle Ages, Arabic physicians contributed to a large extent for the expansion of the usage of garlic as a remedy. In the same period, the retrograde Western Europe knew nothing about garlic.
Garlic was brought into Great Britain in 1548, from the coasts of the Mediterranean Sea, where it was present in abundance. The French, Spanish and Portuguese introduced garlic to the New World. Garlic was rare in traditional English cuisine. It was in the first quarter of the 20th century, when garlic was found in ethnic dishes in U.S.
During 1920’s garlic was referred as Bronx vanilla, halitosis, and Italian perfume. It was in 1940, when garlic gained its value as a major ingredient rather than a minor seasoning agent.
In the first world war, garlic was widely used as an antiseptic to prevent gangrene and today people use garlic to help prevent atherosclerosis and improve high blood pressure.
History of garlic
