I

 

IRIS

(IRIS GERMANICA)

Flower-de-Luce

It is so well known, being nourished up in most gardens, that I shall not need to spent time in writing a description thereof. [Found throughout Europe. Widely grown as a garden ornamental and naturalized in many parts of the world.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: The herb is Lunar. The juice or decoction of the green root of the flaggy kind of Iris, with a little honey drank, doth purge and cleanse the stomach of gross and tough phlegm, and choler [bile] therein. It helps the jaundice and the dropsy, evacuating those humours both upwards and downwards; and because it somewhat hurts the stomach, is not to be taken without honey and spikenard. The same being drank, doth ease the pains and torments of the belly and sides, the shaking of agues, the diseases of the liver and spleen, the worms of the belly, the stone in the kidneys, convulsions and cramps that come of old humours; it also helps those whose seed passes from them unawares. It is a remedy against the bitings and stinging of venomous creatures, being boiled in water and vinegar and drank. Boiled in water and drank, it provokes urine, helps the cholic, brings down women’s courses. It is much commended against the cough, to expectorate rough phlegm. It much eases pains in the head, and procures sleep; being put into the nostrils it procures sneezing, and thereby purges the head of phlegm. The juice of the root applied to the piles or hemorrhoids, gives much ease. The decoction of the roots gargled in the mouth, eases the toothache, and helps the stinking breath. The root itself, either green or in powder, helps to cleanse, heal, and incarnate wounds, and to cover the naked bones with flesh again, that ulcers have made bare; and is also very good to cleanse and heal up fistulas and cankers that are hard to be cured.

MODERN USES: The common garden iris and its many hybrids, especially the dried root of Iris germanica var. florentina (Orris root), are used as a fixative in potpourris for their violet-like fragrance. Garden iris is traditionally used in cough suppressant and bronchial teas and is considered strongly laxative. CAUTION: The dried root is typically not used because of potential toxicity; such effects are revealed in detail by Culpeper as “virtues.”

 

IVY

(HEDERA HELIX)

It is so well known to every child almost, to grow in woods upon the trees, and upon the stone walls of churches, houses, &c. and sometimes to grow alone of itself, though but seldom.

PLACE: [An evergreen woody vine native to most of Europe; grown as an ornamental and widely naturalized in Asia and North America.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: It is under the dominion of Saturn. A pinch of the flowers, which may be about a dram, (saith Dioscorides) drank twice a day in red wine, helps the lask [diarrhea], and bloody flux [dysentery]. It is an enemy to the nerves and sinews, being much taken inwardly, but very helpful to them, being outwardly applied. Pliny saith, the yellow berries are good against the jaundice; and taken before one be set to drink hard, preserves from drunkenness, and helps those that spit blood. The berries are a singular remedy to prevent the plague, as also to free them from it that have got it, by drinking the berries thereof made into a powder, for two or three days together. They being taken in wine, do certainly help to break the stone, provoke urine, and women’s courses. The fresh leaves of Ivy, boiled in vinegar, and applied warm to the sides of those that are troubled with the spleen, ache, or stitch in the sides, do give much ease. The same applied with some Rosewater, and oil of Roses, to the temples and forehead, eases the headache, though it be of long continuance. The fresh leaves boiled in wine, and old filthy ulcers hard to be cured washed therewith, do wonderfully help to cleanse them. It also quickly heals green wounds, and is effectual to heal all burnings and scaldings, and all kinds of ulcerations coming thereby, or by salt phlegm or humours in other parts of the body. The juice of the berries or leaves snuffed up into the nose, purges the head and brain of thin rheum [watery discharge] that makes defluxions into the eyes and nose, and curing the ulcers and stench therein. Those that are troubled with the spleen, shall find much ease by continual drinking out of a cup made of Ivy, so as the drink may stand some small time therein before it be drank. Cato saith, that wine put into such a cup, will soak through it, by reason of the antipathy that is between them. There seems to be a very great antipathy between wine and Ivy; for if one hath got a surfeit by drinking of wine, his speediest cure is to drink a draught of the same wine wherein a handful of Ivy leaves, being first bruised, have been boiled.

MODERN USES: Ivy is a folk medicine for gout and rheumatism and is used externally for burns and wounds. Components of the leaves have anti-bacterial, anti-inflammatory, and analgesic effects, among others. Extracts of ivy leaf are used in modern phytomedicine as an expectorant and antispasmodic for catarrhs of the upper respiratory tract and in the treatment of inflammatory bronchial conditions. Mostly used in prepared, standardized extracts, rarely as a home remedy. CAUTION: The fresh leaves are known to cause contact dermatitis. The berries are considered potentially toxic; avoid.