Pliny the Elder and Dioscorides said that borage was the nepenthe mentioned in Homer, which caused forgetfulness when mixed with wine.
King Henry VIII's last wife, Catherine Parr, used borage in a concoction to treat melancholy.
Francis Bacon thought that borage had "an excellent spirit to repress the fuliginous vapour of dusky melancholie."
John Gerard's Herball mentions an old verse concerning the plant: "Ego Borago, Gaudia semper ago (I, Borage, bring always joys)". He asserts:
Those of our time do use the flowers in salads to exhilerate and make the mind glad. There be also many things made of these used everywhere for the comfort of the heart, for the driving away of sorrow and increasing the joy of the mind. The leaves and flowers of Borage put into wine make men and women glad and merry and drive away all sadness, dullness and melancholy, as Dioscorides and Pliny affirm. Syrup made of the flowers of Borage comfort the heart, purge melancholy and quiet the frantic and lunatic person. The leaves eaten raw engender good blood, especially in those that have been lately sick.
"hellebore" used by Hippocrates as a purgative.
Despite its toxicity, "black hellebore" was used by the Greek and Romans to treat paralysis, gout and other diseases, more particularly insanity.
H. niger is commonly called the Christmas rose, due to an old legend that it sprouted in the snow from the tears of a young girl who had no gift to give the Christ Child in Bethlehem.
In Greek mythology, Melampus of Pylos used hellebore to save the daughters of the king of Argos from a madness, induced by Dionysus, that caused them to run naked through the city, crying, weeping, and screaming.
During the Siege of Kirrha in 585 BC, hellebore was reportedly used by the Greek besiegers to poison the city's water supply. The defenders were subsequently so weakened by diarrhea that they were unable to defend the city from assault.
In a fit of madness induced by Hera, Heracles killed his children by Megara. His madness was cured using hellebore.
Hellebore plants are usually left alone by animals such as deer and rabbits because the leaves of the plant produce poisonous alkaloids, making them distasteful to animals. The poisonous alkaloids have been known to sometimes bother gardeners with sensitive skin.
Symptoms of ingestion include: burning of the mouth and throat, salivation, vomiting, abdominal cramping, diarrhea, nervous symptoms, and possibly depression. Consuming large quantities of hellebore plants can be fatal.
The poison on the outside of the plant causes irritation and burning sensations on the skin.
The species historically known as "Black hellebore" cause tinnitus, vertigo, stupor, thirst, anaphylaxis, emesis (vomiting), catharsis, bradycardia (slowing of the heart rate), and finally, collapse and death from cardiac arrest.
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Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy:
“Black hellebore, that most renowned plant, and famous purger of melancholy, which all antiquity so much used and admired, was first found out by Melanpodius a shepherd, as Pliny records, lib. 25. cap. 5 who, seeing it to purge his goats when they raved..."
a common proverb among the Greeks and Latins, to bid a dizzard or a mad man go take hellebore; as in Lucian, Menippus to Tantalus, Tantale desipis, helleboro epoto tibi opus est, eoque sane meraco, thou art out of thy little wit, O Tantalus, and must needs drink hellebore, and that without mixture.
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