NEEM(Azadirachta indica)
Possessed of many and great virtues, this native Indian tree has been identified on five-thousand year old seals excavated from the Indus valley civilization. India’s earliest societies used margosa or neem leaves to exorcise the spirits of the dead.
Today the margosa is valued more highly for its capacity to exorcise the demons of disease than the spirits of the dead, and an image of the folk goddess Sitala can often be seen suspended from a margosa branch where she guards against smallpox, once the great killer of the Indian countryside. With the eradication of smallpox, now bathing in a margosa-leaf infusion, excellent for soothing scabs and clearing away scars, marks the ritual termination of an chicken pox or measles. Renowned for its antiseptic and disinfectant properties, the tree is thought to be particularly protective of women and children. Delivery chambers are fumigated with Its burning bark. Dried margosa leaves are burned as a mosquito repellent. Fresh leaves, notorious for their bitterness, are cooked eaten to gain immunity from malaria. this tree, so beloved of India-with its fine starlike flowers, its long lime colored berries, and its feathery crests tossing fifty feet into the sky-is an invaluable natural pesticide and its oil is used to protect the bark of other trees from termites. For centuries its leaves have been used to store grain, or to preserve papers and clothes. Ecologically sympathetic, the classical texts of Indian architecture even call the margosa "Earth’s wish-fulfilling tree" because its inflorescence is purifying and its termite- resistant timber is invaluable to house construction in the tropics.