Background: The Mountains of the Western Lesser Caucasus with its rich plant diversity, multicultural and multilingual nature, host diverse ethnobotanical knowledge related to medicinal plants. However, medicinal ethnobotany and the factors shaping the patterns of plant knowledge/use in the region have not been investigated broadly yet. Doing so could show the variations between communities and highlight the acknowledged salient medicinal plant species. We aimed to determine and discuss the similarities and differences of medicinal ethnobotany among people living in highland pastures on both sides of Georgia-Turkey border.
Methods: During 2017 and 2018 summer transhumance period, we interviewed 119 participants, 74 in Turkey, 45 in Georgia, with semi-structured. We structured our data in use-reports (URs) following ICPC classification. We used Cultural Importance (CI) Index, Informant Consensus Factor (FIC), shared/separate species-use combinations, as well as literature data for comparison.
Results:We documented 63 native wild woody plant species nearly half of which are in common on both side of the border. 267 distinct species-use combinations are reported.Only 7% of themare shared.Around 63% of the reports have not been mentioned specifically in the literature. The species having similar/same use reports in both countries are Picea orientalis, Pinus sylvestris var. hamata, Berberis vulgaris, Sambucus nigra, Vaccinium arctostaphylos, Vaccinium myrtillus, Tilia rubra subsp. caucasica, Crataegus monogyna, Rosa canina, Rosa hirtissima and Sorbus aucaparia. For 40% of the species in both countries, more than one plant part is used medicinally.The most common way of using shrubs and trees as medicine in Georgia is drinking the water infusion of fruits and leaves, while in Turkey drinking the water decoction of fruits and roots. 60% of the top 20 genera in both countries have use reports for at least three medicinal use categories. The most cited reports with high agreement arerelated with the treatment of digestive disorders in both countries. It seems that patterns of medicinal knowledge is connected with more than one cultural factors in particular etnolinguistic diversity, cultural background, and access to multilingual written folk and scientific literature,even combination of various factors.
Conclusion: Considering their floral similarity, common historical/cultural contact along with similar livelihood strategies, shared ethnomedicinal knowledge across the border is quite low. Even though the effects of accessing multilingual written folk and scientific literature is likely to be significantly relevant, the factors that shape the medicinal knowledgepatterns of the communities seem complex and dynamic which needs further assessments considering intracultural diversity, socio-economical conditions, as well as political history across the border.