After the First Full Moon in April ─ A Sourcebook of Herbal Medicine from a California Indian Elder

In this extraordinary book Josephine Peters, a respected northern California Indian elder and Native healer, shares her vast, lifelong cultural and plant knowledge. The book begins with Josephine's personal and tribal history and gathering ethics. Josephine then instructs the reader in medicinal and plant food preparations and offers an illustrated catalog of the uses and doses of over 160 plants. At a time of the commercialization of traditional ecological knowledge, Peters presents her rich tradition on her own terms, and according to her spiritual convictions about how her knowledge should be shared. This volume is essential for anyone working in ethnobotany, ethnomedicine, environmental anthropology, Native American studies, and Western and California culture and history.

Josephine Peters (Karuk, Shasta, Avenake) was an esteemed elder, cultural leader, and Indian herbalist and medicine woman. She led many prominent Native cultural initiatives in California and because of her renown as a healer was invited to conferences and universities around the world. She was also an accomplished basket weaver and artist who taught, lectured, demonstrated, and exhibited in countless forums, including University of California Riverside, Humboldt State University, the Heard Museum, the Smithsonian Folklike Festival, and the San Diego Museum of Man. She passed away in October, 2011. Beverly Ortiz, Ph.D., is a Lecturer in the anthropology department at California State University East Bay, Contributing Editor to News from Native California, ethnographic consultant and park naturalist.