Juliette de Bairacli Levy is one of the modern grandmothers of western herbalism. An Englishwoman who attended veterinary school in Manchester, left college to travel and study natural herbal therapies. She traveled and lived throughout the mediterranean particularly in Kythira, Greece where she lived in natural dwellings and abandoned villas with her pack of dogs. She authored many books focusing on animal health as well as child and mother herbal health. She has been a source of inspiration for herbalists such as Rosemary Gladstar and Susun Weed. During the second world war, she tended wounded soldiers with sphagnum moss while she worked in the Women's Land Army in England and was praised for her actions that saved entire flocks of sheep who were deemed "incurable" by conventional veteranarians.
She lived in Israel with her two children in the 1950's where they raised many animals including owls, hawks, dogs, goats, donkeys and bees. Juliette became famous for saving her hives of bees from shell attack during the six day war. She moved to Greece and raised her famous Afghan hounds and continued her research for herbal remedies for humans and animals. She spent many years traveling and learning the folklore and herbal wisdom of peasants and gypsies in Spain, Morocco, Tunisia, Israel, Turkey, Greece and France. Many of the remedies and stories she learned, she documented and published in her books. Her most well known book is her Complete Herbal Handbook for Farm and Stable (1951) and it was the first veterinary herbal book to be published, the art of gypsies and peasants had only previously been passed on through spoken word.
Her knowledge and wisdom have been a gift to the world of herbalism and natural pet care. She passed away in a home in Bergdorf, Switzerland at the age of 97. She will be missed.
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