1,000-year-old onion and garlic eye remedy kills MRSA

Last updated on 24 JUN 2025

In a quiet corner of the British Library, nestled among medieval manuscripts, a 1,000-year-old medical text has helped ignite one of the most surprising discoveries in modern antimicrobial research. Known as Bald’s Leechbook, the Anglo-Saxon manuscript was once seen as little more than a historical artifact—an intriguing glimpse into early medieval medicine, complete with remedies for ailments ranging from headaches to infections. But when a team of researchers at the University of Nottingham recreated one of its recipes—a blend of garlic, onion or leek, wine, and cow bile meant to treat eye infections—they uncovered a startling truth: this ancient concoction could kill up to 90% of MRSA, a deadly antibiotic-resistant bacterium. The finding has sparked new hope in the fight against antimicrobial resistance, a mounting global crisis that threatens to render many of our most relied-upon antibiotics ineffective. At the same time, it’s prompting scientists and historians alike to reconsider what ancient knowledge might still have to teach us. Could the answers to modern medicine’s toughest questions be buried not just in future innovation, but also in the overlooked wisdom of the past?

Rediscovering a Medieval Remedy with Modern Potential

Among the aging manuscripts housed in the British Library lies Bald’s Leechbook, a 9th-century medical compendium that, until recently, was of interest mainly to historians of medicine and linguists. Written in Old English, the text is a collection of remedies compiled by an Anglo-Saxon healer, featuring treatments that range from the ritualistic to the surprisingly methodical. One such entry, a recipe for an “eye salve” designed to treat eye infections, caught the attention of a cross-disciplinary team at the University of Nottingham. What seemed at first like a quaint medieval curiosity—a mixture of garlic, onion or leek, wine, and bovine bile—was soon revealed to have potent antibacterial properties when tested under modern laboratory conditions.

Intrigued by the potential medical value of historical knowledge, Anglo-Saxon scholar Dr. Christina Lee translated the remedy and collaborated with microbiologist Dr. Freya Harrison and her team to recreate the concoction as faithfully as possible. The preparation involved crushing equal parts of garlic and either onion or leek, combining the mixture with English wine sourced from a historical vineyard, adding bovine bile salts dissolved in distilled water, and then storing the salve at 4°C for nine days. This step-by-step reconstruction aimed to mirror the medieval process not only in ingredients but in method and environmental conditions. The researchers originally hypothesized that the recipe might yield mild antimicrobial activity—perhaps a small nod to the antiseptic qualities of garlic. What they found, however, was far more remarkable. When applied to large cultures of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA)—a notorious and resilient superbug—the salve demonstrated an ability to kill up to 90% of the bacteria. Even more surprising was the fact that none of the individual ingredients achieved similar results when tested in isolation. It was the combination, and perhaps the specific preparation method, that made the mixture so lethal to the bacteria. “We were absolutely blown away by just how effective the combination of ingredients was,” Dr. Harrison remarked when presenting the results at the Society for General Microbiology’s Annual Conference. The finding suggests a level of sophistication in the remedy’s design, hinting at empirical experimentation that goes beyond mere folklore. This unexpected discovery invites a reappraisal of early medieval medical practices. Far from being purely mystical or anecdotal, some treatments recorded in texts like Bald’s Leechbook may reflect a proto-scientific approach—an early form of the scientific method based on careful observation, trial and error, and empirical adjustment. It also underscores the value of interdisciplinary research that bridges the humanities and sciences. In reexamining a forgotten manuscript with fresh eyes and rigorous tools, researchers have opened the door to a novel avenue in the fight against antibiotic resistance—one that draws on the past not as superstition, but as untapped scientific insight.

MRSA and the Mounting Threat of Antibiotic Resistance

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is one of the most well-known and feared superbugs in modern medicine. A strain of the common Staphylococcus aureus bacteria, MRSA has evolved resistance to many frontline antibiotics, including methicillin, penicillin, and amoxicillin. In healthcare settings, it poses a serious risk—particularly to patients with open wounds, weakened immune systems, or invasive devices like catheters. MRSA can lead to severe bloodstream infections, pneumonia, surgical site infections, and, in extreme cases, sepsis or death. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), MRSA causes approximately 10,000 deaths annually in the United States alone, and tens of thousands more around the world face prolonged illness or disability due to such infections.

The emergence of MRSA is part of a broader and increasingly alarming phenomenon: antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Over time, the widespread use—and often misuse—of antibiotics in both human medicine and agriculture has accelerated the evolution of resistant bacteria. When antibiotics are used too frequently or inappropriately, they create selective pressure that allows only the most resilient strains to survive and multiply. The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared AMR one of the top ten global public health threats, warning that without urgent action, we could be entering a “post-antibiotic era” in which common infections once again become deadly. What makes MRSA and other resistant pathogens so dangerous is not just their resistance, but the lack of new antibiotics being developed to replace those that have lost their effectiveness. Pharmaceutical innovation in the antibiotic space has slowed considerably in recent decades due to economic and regulatory challenges, leaving healthcare systems with dwindling treatment options. In this context, the discovery that a thousand-year-old natural remedy could rival modern antibiotics is not only scientifically intriguing—it is potentially life-saving. By demonstrating that Bald’s eye salve could destroy MRSA where many current treatments falter, the Nottingham team has added a surprising and hopeful chapter to the AMR narrative. It offers a reminder that the search for new solutions need not be confined to the laboratory bench or biotech pipeline; it may also be hidden in overlooked corners of history, waiting to be revisited with modern scientific tools. As antibiotic resistance continues to rise, such interdisciplinary explorations are no longer academic exercises—they are a necessary part of the global response.

Ancient Knowledge, Modern Science

The success of the recreated Anglo-Saxon remedy invites a deeper reflection on the value of historical medical texts—not merely as cultural artifacts, but as potential repositories of empirical knowledge. Bald’s Leechbook is one of the oldest known English medical manuscripts, dating back to the 9th century. While some of its contents are steeped in the spiritual and symbolic worldview of its time, others display a startling degree of practical knowledge and methodological structure. In the case of the eye salve, the ingredients were not simply thrown together at random. The detailed instructions—specifying preparation techniques, storage temperature, and even a nine-day waiting period—suggest a trial-and-error process that is not far removed from today’s scientific protocols. Dr. Christina Lee, who translated the text and co-led the study, points out that this level of specificity could indicate an early understanding of how to extract and preserve the active compounds in certain plants and animal products. Rather than viewing such texts as primitive or mystical, modern researchers are beginning to appreciate that they may reflect centuries of accumulated observational knowledge—especially when it comes to treating infections. Dr. Lee has also noted that other medieval texts contain similar remedies for conditions we now understand to be bacterial in nature, hinting at a lost body of therapeutic insight. The Nottingham team’s approach—combining historical linguistics, ethnobotany, microbiology, and analytical chemistry—is a model of interdisciplinary collaboration. By treating the medieval manuscript not as a superstition-riddled curiosity but as a legitimate, testable source of information, they were able to unlock a treatment that had lain dormant for a millennium. It’s a reminder that scientific progress doesn’t always move in a straight line; sometimes, the future of medicine involves circling back to the past with new questions and better tools. This approach also reflects a growing movement within the scientific community to reexamine traditional and historical remedies with modern rigor. Ethnopharmacology, for instance, systematically studies traditional medicinal practices from around the world, using contemporary techniques to identify active compounds and assess their safety and efficacy. The eye salve study stands as a compelling example of what can happen when we bridge the gap between ancient practice and modern proof—transforming historical anecdote into actionable knowledge.

Rethinking Drug Discovery and Public Health Strategy

The implications of the Bald’s eye salve study extend far beyond historical curiosity—they touch the core of contemporary challenges in public health and pharmaceutical research. As antibiotic resistance continues to outpace the development of new drugs, medical researchers are being pushed to think creatively about where new therapies might come from. The standard drug development pipeline—often focused on synthetic compounds and high-throughput screening—has yielded fewer novel antibiotics in recent decades. Against this backdrop, the success of a millennium-old natural remedy suggests that alternative sources, including historical texts and traditional medicines, could be vital in diversifying our antimicrobial arsenal. One key takeaway from the University of Nottingham team’s work is the importance of synergy between ingredients. The study found that none of the components—garlic, onion or leek, wine, or ox bile—were effective against MRSA on their own. Only when prepared together, using the method described in the original recipe, did the treatment exhibit its full antibacterial power. This finding has major implications for drug discovery. Much of modern pharmaceutical research isolates single compounds for testing, which can overlook potentially powerful effects created by the interaction of multiple ingredients. As Dr. Freya Harrison noted, understanding these combinations requires stepping outside the conventional frameworks of drug testing and embracing more integrative approaches.

From a public health perspective, the discovery also prompts a reevaluation of what constitutes a “valid” or “modern” treatment. Natural remedies have often been dismissed due to their association with unregulated folk medicine or lack of standardized testing. However, when subjected to rigorous scientific evaluation, as in the case of the eye salve, some of these treatments may prove not only effective but crucial in filling gaps left by traditional antibiotics. Public health agencies and research institutions may need to consider expanding funding and institutional support for studies that investigate such historical or traditional sources—not as alternatives to modern medicine, but as complements to it.

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