People around the world eat some weird and wacky things. Frogs, snakes, or crickets, anyone?
If the creepy-crawlers aren’t giving you an appetite, what about pearls? “But, aren’t pearls too beautiful and precious to be eaten?”, you might ask. “Aren’t they used to make things like wedding rings, necklaces, or bracelets? Besides, aren’t pearls just too hard and too expensive to use as food?”
Well, you’re partly right. For thousands of years, pearls were just too plain expensive for common people to eat. Only the most wealthy and powerful few had the privilege to actually consume them.
Yet, believe it or not, in many ancient civilizations, people processed and used pearls in a variety of ways to improve their health, beauty, longevity, emotional, mental and spiritual well-being.
In ancient China, for example, Taoist masters used ground pearl alchemically to achieve longevity and immortality, while imperial families both ingested pearl powder and applied it externally to partake of the pearl’s numerous benefits. When taken internally, they believed pearl powder could:
- Calm the mind, reduce stress and anxiety, and improve mental acuity and focus
- Enhance memory
- Promote emotional balance
- Drive away evil spirits
- Cleanse liver
- Improve eyesight
- Prevent eye degeneration and disease
- Nourish the kidney and heart
- Nourish and strengthen bone
- Whitening and strengthening teeth
- Nourish and strengthen muscle and speed up muscle recovery
- Rejuvenate skin and heal skin problems
- Stop children from crying at night due to fear or disturbances
- Heal stomach illness
- Help people live longer and healthier lives
Externally, they also used pearl powder as an ingredient in the following applications:
- Facial cream for younger looking skin
- Toothpaste/powder for whiter and stronger teeth
- Eye drops to promote eye health and better vision
- Liniment for wounds, sores, burns or other skin inflammations
But it wasn’t only in China that the ancients used pearl powder. It’s recorded that in ancient Egypt, Cleopatra drank the vinegar wine with a pearl in it to enhance her beauty and health. Archaeologists have also found that Native Americans considered pearl to have magical healing powers, while Mayan “dentists” used pearl as a tooth filling which grew seamlessly into the existing teeth!
