I have recently learned about the wonders of this Native tradition,and have some questions for folx.
I would like to harvest my own herbs to smudge with, but i unfortunately live in WesternNewEngland, where no white sage grows at all.I just cant stomach the idea of buying another cultures sacred plant wrapped in plastic from a Newage store as a consumer product anymore.
Can anybody sugest any other herbs i might be able to use for clearing spacethat are local to this bioregion,especially ones that would have been used by my Euro ancestors?
As for the obvious.There is a little sweetgrass here, but the local Natives guard its locations very scrupilously from Non natives and i want to respect their wishes as i am not Native .Also the species of cedar here i can find(Arbor Vitae, i think, the one used for landscaping) burns wrong and doesnt seem effecatious at all.
Ive heard that Juniper is used by some indiginous peoples(Siberian shaman,Sumerians,Bon i think as well ect) as well as mugwort (used by medival european herbalists as a fumigant to "banish demons"..sounds like smudging to me) both grow local enough I can probably find thembut ive found that they also burn weird(juniper especially it flashes instead of smouldering).I also recently learned that rosemary was used instead of frankincense when the catholics couldnt get it, but cant get it to burn right without charchol.
Any ideas to help with my culturally appropriate spring cleaning?