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MADDER

(RUBIA TINCTORUM)

DESCRIPTION: Garden Madder shoots forth many very long, weak, four-square, reddish stalks, trailing on the ground a great way. At every one of these joints come forth diverse long and narrow leaves, standing like a star about the stalks, towards the tops whereof come forth many small pale-yellow flowers.

PLACE: Manured in gardens, or larger fields. [Originates in central and western Asia and the Mediterranean region of Europe. Cultivated and naturalized elsewhere in Europe and northern Africa.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: It is an herb of Mars. It hath an opening quality, and afterwards to bind and strengthen. It is a sure remedy for the yellow jaundice, by opening the obstructions of the liver and gall, and cleansing those parts; it opens also the obstructions of the spleen, and diminishes the melancholy humour. It is available for the palsy and sciatica, and effectual for bruises inward and outward, and is therefore much used in vulnerary drinks. The root for all those aforesaid purposes, is to be boiled in wine or water, as the cause requires, and some honey and sugar put thereunto afterwards. The seed hereof taken in vinegar and honey, helps the swelling and hardness of the spleen. The leaves and roots beaten and applied to any part that is discoloured with freckles, morphew [skin blemishes], the white scurf, or any such deformity of the skin, cleanses thoroughly, and takes them away.

MODERN USES: Anthraquinones in the root and rhizome of madder are probably responsible for its anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, antidiarrheal, and antifungal activity as a folk medicine, especially for the treatment of bladder and kidney calculi. Components of the root have been studied for potential anti-cancer activity. Commercially, it is historically valued as a red and purple dye material.

 

MAIDENHAIR

(ADIANTUM CAPILLUS-VENERIS)

Venus Maidenhair Fern

DESCRIPTION: Our common Maidenhair doth, from a number of hard black fibers, send forth a great many blackish shining brittle stalks, hardly a span long, in many not half so long, on each side set very thick with small, round, dark green leaves, and spitted on the back of them like a fern.

PLACE: It grows upon old stone walls, and by springs, wells, and rocky moist and shady places, and is always green. [Found throughout temperate regions of the Northern and Southern Hemispheres.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: [See White Maidenhair, below.]

MODERN USES: Little used today. Maidenhair fronds were once used as a tea substitute. The leaves were used as a folk medicine for the treatment of sore throat, bronchitis, and coughs. Antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, analgesic, and wound-healing activity are suggested by recent research. Used in various traditional cultures as a hair wash to prevent baldness and make dark hair shiny.

 

MAIDENHAIR, WHITE

(ASPLENIUM RUTA-MURARIA; SYN. ADIANTUM RUTA-MURARIA)

Wall Rue

DESCRIPTION: This has very fine, pale green stalks, almost as fine as hairs, set confusedly with diverse pale green leaves on every short foot stalk.

PLACE: [A widespread fern on rocky outcrops. Native to East Asia, eastern North America, and much of Europe.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: Both this and the former are under the dominion of Mercury, and so is that also which follows after, and the virtue of both are so near alike, that though I have described them and their places of growing severally, yet I shall in writing the virtues of them, join them both together as follows.

The decoction of the herb Maidenhair being drank, helps those that are troubled with the cough, shortness of breath, the yellow jaundice, diseases of the spleen, stopping of urine, and helps exceedingly to break the stone in the kidneys. It provokes women’s courses, and stays both bleedings and fluxes of the stomach and belly, especially when the herb is dry; for being green, it loosens the belly, and voids choler [bile] and phlegm from the stomach and liver; it cleanses the lungs, and by rectifying the blood, causes a good colour to the whole body. The herb boiled in oil of Chamomile, dissolves knots, allays swellings, and dries up moist ulcers. The lye made thereof is singularly good to cleanse the head from scurf, and from dry and running sores, stays the falling or shedding of the hair, and causes it to grow thick, fair, and well coloured; for which purpose some boil it in wine, putting some Smallage seed thereto, and afterwards some oil. The Wall Rue is as effectual as Maidenhair, in all diseases of the head, or falling and recovering of the hair again, and generally for all the aforementioned diseases: And besides, the powder of it taken in drink for forty days together, helps the burstings in children.

MODERN USES: White maidenhair has fallen into obscurity and disuse.

 

MALLOWS

(MALVA SPP.)

AND MARSHMALLOW

(ALTHAEA OFFICINALIS)

Common Mallows are generally so well known that they need no description.

Our common Marshmallows have diverse soft hairy white stalks, rising to be three or four feet high, spreading forth many branches, the leaves whereof are soft and hairy, somewhat less than the other Mallow leaves. The flowers are many, but smaller also than the other Mallows, and white, or tending to a bluish colour.

PLACE: The common Mallows grow [throughout Europe, Asia, and North America]. The common Marshmallows [grow] in most salt marshes [in Europe and eastern North America and are widely grown in herb gardens].

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: Venus owns them both. The leaves of either of the sorts, both specified, and the roots also boiled in wine or water, or in broth with Parsley or Fennel roots, do help to open the body, and are very convenient in hot agues, or other distempers of the body, to apply the leaves so boiled warm to the belly. It not only voids hot, choleric, and other offensive humours, but eases the pains and torments of the belly coming thereby; and are therefore used in all clysters conducing to those purposes. The same used by nurses procures them store of milk. The decoction of the seed of any of the common Mallows made in milk or wine, doth marvelously help excoriations, the phthisic, pleurisy, and other diseases of the chest and lungs, that proceed of hot causes, if it be continued taking for some time together. The leaves and roots work the same effects. They help much also in the excoriations of the bowels, and hardness of the mother, and in all hot and sharp diseases thereof. Pliny saith, that whosoever takes a spoonful of any of the Mallows, shall that day be free from all diseases that may come unto him; and that it is especially good for the falling-sickness. The syrup also and conserve made of the flowers, are very effectual for the same diseases, and to open the body, being costive.

The leaves bruised, and laid to the eyes with a little honey, take away the imposthumations [inflammation] of them. The leaves bruised or rubbed upon any place stung with bees, wasps, or the like, presently take away the pain, redness, and swelling that rise thereupon. And Dioscorides saith, the decoction of the roots and leaves helps all sorts of poison, so as the poison be presently voided by vomit. A poultice made of the leaves boiled and bruised, with some bean or barley flower, and oil of Roses added, is an especial remedy against all hard tumours and inflammations, or imposthumes [abscesses], or swellings of the private parts, and other parts, and eases the pains of them; as also against the hardness of the liver or spleen, being applied to the places. The juice of Mallows boiled in old oil and applied, takes away all roughness of the skin, as also the scurf, dandruff, or dry scabs in the head, or other parts, if they be anointed therewith, or washed with the decoction, and preserves the hair from falling off. It is also effectual against scaldings and burnings, St. Anthony’s fire, and all other hot, red, and painful swellings in any part of the body. The flowers boiled in oil or water whereunto a little honey and alum is put, is an excellent gargle to wash, cleanse or heal any sore mouth or throat in a short space. If the feet be bathed or washed with the decoction of the leaves, roots, and flowers, it helps much the defluxions of rheum [watery discharge] from the head; if the head be washed therewith, it stays the falling and shedding of the hair. The green leaves (saith Pliny) beaten with nitre, and applied, draw out thorns or prickles in the flesh.

The Marshmallows are more effectual in all the diseases before mentioned.

You may remember that not long since there was a raging disease called the bloody-flux [dysentery with bleeding]; the college of physicians not knowing what to make of it, called it the inside plague, for their wits were at Ne plus ultra about it: My son was taken with the same disease, and the excoriation of his bowels was exceeding great; myself being in the country, was sent for, the only thing I gave him, was Mallows bruised and boiled both in milk and drink. In two days (the blessing of God being upon it) it cured him. And I here, to shew my thankfulness to God, in communicating it to his creatures, leave it to posterity.

MODERN USES: Mallow (Malva spp.) and marshmallow leaf and root are high in soothing mucilagin and continue to be used in modern phytomedicine. The leaf is used in tea to relieve dry, irritated coughs, and for inflammations of the mouth and throat. Marshmallow leaf tea soothes gastrointestinal mucous membrane inflammation. The root tea is used similarly and considered somewhat more effective than the leaf.

 

MARSH WOUNDWORT

(STACHYS PALUSTRIS)

Clown’s Woundwort

DESCRIPTION: It grows up sometimes to two or three feet high, with square green rough stalks, and two very long, somewhat narrow, leaves. The flowers stand towards the tops, end in a spiked top, having long and much gaping hoods of a purplish red colour, with whitish spots in them. This plant smells somewhat strong.

PLACE: It grows in [moist soils and ditches from Europe to Mongolia and the Western Himalayas. Naturalized in the northeastern United States, the northern Midwest, and adjacent provinces in Canada].

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: It is under the dominion of the planet Saturn. It is singularly effectual in all fresh and green wounds, and therefore bears not this name for naught. And it is very available in staunching of blood and to dry up the fluxes of humours in old fretting ulcers, cankers, etc., that hinder the healing of them. A syrup made of the juice of it, is inferior to none for inward wounds, ruptures of veins, bloody flux [dysentery], vessels broken, spitting, urinating, or vomiting blood. Ruptures are excellent and speedily, ever to admiration, cured by taking now and then a little of the syrup, and applying an ointment or plaster of this herb to the place. Also, if any vein be swelled or muscle, apply a plaster of this herb to it, and if you add a little Comfrey to it, it will not be amiss. I assure thee the herb deserves commendation, though it has gotten such a clownish name; and whosoever reads this (if he try it, as I have done) will commend it; only take notice that it is of a dry earthy quality.

MODERN USES: Marsh woundwort is used traditionally for the external treatment of wounds. Its chemistry has been recently analyzed and shown to have biologically active compounds typical of its relatives in the mint family, with antioxidant, antispasmodic, antimicrobial, and possibly anti-inflammatory activity. With a slightly bitter-aromatic flavor (though unpleasant fragrance), the young leaves are used sparingly as a salad ingredient in eastern Europe. The roots are also considered edible along with the springtime shoots. It is surprisingly little researched.

 

MASTERWORT

(PEUCEDANUM OSTRUTHIUM; SYN. IMPERATORIA OSTRUTHIUM)

DESCRIPTION: Common Masterwort has diverse stalks of winged leaves divided, three for the most part standing together at a small foot-stalk; among which rise up two or three short stalks about two feet high, bearing umbels of white flowers, and after them thin, flat blackish seeds, bigger than Dill seeds.

PLACE: It is usually kept in gardens with us in England. [Native to most of western Europe. A garden plant that has escaped in Great Britain, Scandinavia, and eastern North America.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: It is an herb of Mars. The root of Masterwort is hotter than pepper, and very available in cold griefs and diseases both of the stomach and body, dissolving very powerfully upwards and downwards. It is also used in a decoction with wine against all cold rheums, distillations upon the lungs, or shortness of breath, to be taken morning and evening. It also provokes urine, and helps to break the stone, and expel the gravel from the kidneys. It is effectual also against the dropsy, cramps, and falling sickness; for the decoction in wine being gargled in the mouth, draws down much water and phlegm, from the brain, purging and easing it of what oppresses it. It is of a rare quality against all sorts of cold poison, to be taken as there is cause; it provokes sweat. But lest the taste hereof, or of the seed (which works to the like effect, though not so powerfully) should be too offensive, the best way is to take the water distilled both from the herb and root. The juice hereof dropped, or tents dipped therein, and applied either to green wounds or filthy rotten ulcers, and those that come by envenomed weapons, doth soon cleanse and heal them. The same is also very good to help the gout coming of a cold cause.

MODERN USES: Masterwort is a famous folk medicine in Alpine areas of Western Europe. Traditionally, both the aboveground parts and the root were extracted in wine and used to treat joint pains. The plant was also soaked in schnapps, and this concoction was rubbed into painful limbs. Contains isoimperatorin and imperatorin, which are coumarins with pharmacological effects including analgesic, antiviral, anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, anti-hypertensive, and blood-thinning properties, plus experimental anticancer activity, among others. Plant preparations are used for gastrointestinal problems, cardiovascular conditions, inflammation of the upper respiratory tract, and tiredness. CAUTION: Furocoumarins, like those found in masterwort, can cause photodermatitis and, in some individuals, severe contact dermatitis. In so many words, Culpeper warns us that the root is acrid, bitter, and “hotter than pepper.” Avoid products containing masterwort if you have been prescribed blood thinners.

 

MAY LILY

(MAIANTHEMUM BIFOLIUM)

One-Blade, False Lily-of-the-Valley

DESCRIPTION: This small plant never bears more than one leaf, but only when it rises up with his stalk, which thereon bears another, and seldom more, which are of a blueish green colour, pointed, with many ribs or veins therein [with] many small white flowers, star fashion.

PLACE: It grows in moist, shadowy and grassy places of woods. [Declined in England due to habitat loss; native to western Europe, and from Siberia to China and Japan.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: It is a precious herb of the Sun. Half a dram, or a dram at most, in powder of the roots hereof taken in wine and vinegar, of each equal parts, and the party laid presently to sweat thereupon, is held to be a sovereign remedy for those that are infected with the plague, and have a sore upon them, by expelling the poison and infection, and defending the heart and spirits from danger. It is a singularly good wound herb, and is thereupon used with other the like effects in many compound balms for curing of wounds, be they fresh and green, or old and malignant, and especially if the sinews be burnt.

MODERN USES: May lily was once used topically as a folk remedy for wounds or sores. The fruits were harvested prior to the twentieth century and used for flavoring wine. The fruit contains anthocyanins, which may have antioxidant activity. Little used today.

 

MEADOWRUE

(THALICTRUM MINUS)

DESCRIPTION: Meadowrue rises up with a yellow stringy root, much spreading in the ground, shooting forth new sprouts round about, two feet high, and many large leaves on them, of a red green colour on the upper-side, and pale green underneath. The whole plant has a strong unpleasant scent.

PLACE: It grows in many places of this land, in the borders of moist meadows, and ditch-sides. [Occurs in most of Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: Dioscorides saith, that this herb bruised and applied, perfectly heals old sores, and the distilled water of the herb and flowers doth the like. It is used by some among other pot-herbs to open the body, and make it soluble; but the roots washed clean, and boiled in ale and drank, provokes to stool more than the leaves, but yet very gently. The root boiled in water, and the places of the body most troubled with vermin and lice washed therewith while it is warm, destroys them utterly. In Italy it is good against the plague, and in Saxony against the jaundice, as Camerarius saith.

MODERN USES: Seldom used today. Meadow rue contains alkaloids (including berberine) that have antibacterial activity. Formerly used as a snakebite remedy.

 

MEADOWSWEET

(FILIPENDULA ULMARIA)

Filipendula, Dropwort

DESCRIPTION: This sends forth many leaves, some larger, some smaller, set on each side of a middle rib, and each of them dented about the edges; among which rise up one or more stalks, two or three feet high, spreading at the top into many white, sweet-smelling flowers.

PLACE: [It grows in fields and meadows throughout Europe and northern Asia; sporadically naturalized in North America.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: It is under the dominion of Venus. It effectually opens the passages of the urine, helps the strangury; the stone in the kidneys or bladder, the gravel, and all other pains of the bladder and kidneys, by taking the roots in powder, or a decoction of them in white wine, with a little honey. The roots made into powder, and mixed with honey in the form of an electuary, doth much help them whose stomachs are swollen, dissolving and breaking the wind which was the cause thereof. It is also very effectual for all the diseases of the lungs, as shortness of breath, wheezing, hoarseness of the throat, and the cough; and to expectorate tough phlegm, or any other parts thereabout.

MODERN USES: Meadowsweet famously contains salicylates (the starting material of one of the first synthetic drugs, aspirin), which supports its traditional use as an antiseptic, fever reducer, and pain reliever for rheumatism and arthritis. It is also considered astringent, and a tea of the herb is used for dyspepsia with heartburn, diarrhea, and as a mild urinary antiseptic; also for supportive treatment of colds.

 

MEDLAR

(CRATAEGUS GERMANICA; SYN. MESPILUS GERMANICA)

DESCRIPTION: The tree grows near the bigness of the Quince Tree, spreading branches reasonably large, with longer and narrower leaves. The fruit, of a brownish green colour, being ripe, bearing a crown as it were on the top. The fruit is very harsh before it is mellowed.

PLACE: [Cultivated and naturalized along fence rows and hedges in most of Western and central Europe. Native to Crimea, and from the Caucasus to Iran.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: The fruit is old Saturn’s, and sure a better medicine he hardly hath to strengthen the retentive faculty. They are powerful to stay any fluxes of blood or humours in men or women; the leaves also have this quality. The decoction of them is good to gargle and wash the mouth, throat and teeth, when there is any defluxions of blood to stay it, or of humours, which causes the pains and swellings. It is a good bath for women, that have their courses flow too abundant: or for the piles when they bleed too much. The dried leaves in powder strewed on fresh bleeding wounds restrains the blood, and heals up the wound quickly. The medlar-stones made into powder, and drank in wine, wherein some Parsley-roots have lain infused all night, or a little boiled, do break the stone in the kidneys, helping to expel it.

MODERN USES: Medlar is little used today; the fruit is hard, not tasty, and mostly inedible, but is considered styptic, astringent, and cooling. It was used as a folk medicine to treat diarrhea—and conversely, in preparations to treat constipation. Also used as a diuretic and treatment for kidney and bladder stones in southeastern Europe and western Asia. Leaf extracts have experimental antidiabetic activity.

 

MELANCHOLY THISTLE

(CIRSIUM HETEROPHYLLUM; SYN. CARDUUS HETEROPHYLLUS, CARDUUS HELENOIDES)

DESCRIPTION: It rises up with tender single hoary green stalks, bearing thereon four or five green leaves, dented about the edges; [not] prickly, and at the top usually but one head, scaly and prickly, with many reddish flowers in the middle, which being gathered fresh, will keep the colour a long time.

PLACE: They grow in many moist meadows, [grasslands, scrubs, and open woods in the British Isles and elsewhere in northern Europe and central Asia].

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: It is under Capricorn, and therefore under both Saturn and Mars, one rids melancholy by sympathy, the other by antipathy. Their virtues are but few, but those not to be despised; for the decoction of the thistle in wine being drank, expels superfluous melancholy out of the body, and makes a man as merry as a cricket; superfluous melancholy causes care, fear, sadness, despair, envy, and many evils more besides; but religion teaches to wait upon God’s providence, and cast our care upon him who cares for us. What a fine thing were it if men and women could live so? And yet seven years’ care and fear makes a man never the wiser, nor a farthing richer. Dioscorides saith, the root borne about one doth the like, and removes all diseases of melancholy. Modern writers laugh at him; Let them laugh that win: my opinion is, that it is the best remedy against all melancholy diseases that grows; they that please may use it.

MODERN USES: No modern uses noted. Melancholy thistle was smoked instead of tobacco in Derbyshire, England, in the eighteenth century. It seems that modern societies, suffering from an epidemic of superfluous melancholy, should follow Culpeper’s lead and research this herb.

 

MILK THISTLE

(SILYBUM MARIANUM)

Our Lady’s Thistle

DESCRIPTION: Milk Thistle hath large and broad leaves, and as it were crumpled, of a white green shining colour, wherein are many lines and streaks of a milk white colour with many sharp and stiff prickles all about. At the end of every branch, is a great prickly Thistle-like head, strongly armed with prickles, and with bright purple [flowers]. The whole plant is bitter in taste.

PLACE: [Found in fields and wastelands throughout much of Europe; naturalized as a weed in California.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: Milk Thistle is under Jupiter, and thought to be as effectual as Carduus benedictus for agues, and to prevent and cure the infection of the plague: as also to open the obstructions of the liver and spleen, and thereby is good against the jaundice. It provokes urine, breaks and expels the stone, and is good for the dropsy. It is effectual also for the pains in the sides, and many other inward pains and griping. The seed and distilled water is held powerful to all the purposes aforesaid, and besides, it is often applied both outwardly with cloths or sponges to the region of the liver, to cool the distemper thereof, and to the region of the heart, against swoonings and the passions of it. It cleanses the blood exceedingly: and in Spring, if you please to boil the tender plant (but cut off the prickles, unless you have a mind to choke yourself) it will change your blood as the season changes, and that is the way to be safe.

MODERN USES: Milk thistle is one of the best-studied and most widely used medicinal plants for the supportive treatment of chronic inflammatory liver disorders, including some forms of hepatitis, cirrhosis, and fatty infiltration of the liver by alcohol or other toxins. It is considered both a preventative and treatment for various liver conditions. A purified component from the seeds is used as an intravenous treatment for mushroom poisoning. The active constituents of the seed are a complex of components known as silymarin. Primarily used in products standardized to deliver 420 milligrams of silymarin per day, divided into three doses.

 

MINT

(MENTHA SPICATA)

Spearmint

Of all the kinds of Mint, the Spear Mint, being most usual, I shall only describe as follows:

DESCRIPTION: Spear Mint has diverse round stalks, and long but narrowish leaves set thereon, of a dark green colour. The flowers stand in spiked heads at the tops of the branches, being of a pale blue colour.

PLACE: It is a usual inhabitant in gardens; and because it seldom gives any good seed, the seed is recompensed by the plentiful increase of the root, which being once planted in a garden, will hardly be rid out again.

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: It is an herb of Venus. It stirs up venery, or bodily lust; two or three branches thereof taken in the juice of four pomegranates, stays the hiccough, vomiting, and allays the choler [bile]. It dissolves imposthumes [abscesses] being laid to with barley-meal. It is good to repress the milk in women’s breasts, and for such as have swollen, flagging, or great breasts. Applied with salt, it helps the biting of a mad dog; with mead and honeyed water, it eases the pains of the ears, and takes away the roughness of the tongue, being rubbed thereupon. It suffers not milk to curdle in the stomach, if the leaves thereof be steeped or boiled in it before you drink it. Briefly it is very profitable to the stomach. The often use hereof is a very powerful medicine to stay women’s courses and the whites [vaginal discharges]. Applied to the forehead and temples, it eases the pains in the head, and is good to wash the heads of young children therewith, against all manner of breakings-out, sores or scabs, therein. It is also profitable against the poison of venomous creatures. The distilled water of Mint is available to all the purposes aforesaid, yet more weakly. But if a spirit thereof be rightly and chemically drawn, it is much more powerful than the herb itself. Simeon Sethi saith, it helps a cold liver, strengthens the belly, causes digestion, stays vomits and hiccough. It is good against the gnawing of the heart, provokes appetite, takes away obstructions of the liver, and stirs up bodily lust; but therefore too much must not be taken, because it makes the blood thin and wheyish, and turns it into choler [bile], and therefore choleric persons must abstain from it. The powder of it being dried and taken after meat, helps digestion, and those that are splenetic. Taken with wine, it helps women in their sore travail in child-bearing. It is good against the gravel and stone in the kidneys, and the strangury [painful, frequent urination]. Being smelled unto, it is comfortable for the head and memory. The decoction hereof gargled in the mouth, cures the gums and mouth that are sore, and mends an ill-savored breath; as also the Rue and Coriander, causes the palate of the mouth to turn to its place, the decoction being gargled and held in the mouth.

MODERN USES: Spearmint was the most commonly used mint in Culpeper’s day. Today’s more widely used medicinal herb, peppermint (Mentha × piperita), a hybrid, was not known until decades after Culpeper’s death. Both peppermint and spearmint leaf tea are used to soothe digestive problems, acting as carminatives, reducing nausea, and calming upset stomachs. The essential oil is also used to flavor chewing gum and dental products.

 

MISTLETOE

(VISCUM ALBUM)

Misselto, European Mistletoe

DESCRIPTION: This [parasitic shrub] rises up from the branch or arm of the tree whereon it grows, with a [green] woody stem. At the joints of the boughs and branches [are] small, round, white, transparent berries, three or four together, full of a glutinous moisture.

PLACE: It grows very rarely on oaks with us; plentifully in woody groves [throughout much of Europe; naturalized in California].

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: This is under the dominion of the Sun, I do not question; and can also take for granted, that which grows upon oaks, participates something of the nature of Jupiter, because an oak is one of his trees; as also that which grows upon pear trees, and apple trees, participates something of his nature, because he rules the tree it grows upon, having no root of its own. But why that should have most virtues that grows upon oaks I know not, unless because it is rarest and hardest to come by; and our college’s opinion is in this contrary to scripture, which saith, God’s tender mercies are over all his works; and so it is, let the college of physicians walk as contrary to him as they please, and that is as contrary as the east to the west. Clusius affirms that which grows upon pear trees to be as prevalent, and gives order, that it should not touch the ground after it is gathered; and also saith, that, being hung about the neck, it remedies witchcraft. Both the leaves and berries of Mistletoe do heat and dry, and are of subtle parts. The Mistletoe itself of the oak (as the best) made into powder, and given in drink to those that have the falling sickness, does assuredly heal them, as Matthiolus saith: but it is fit to use it for forty days together. Some have so highly esteemed it for the virtues thereof, that they have called it Lignum Sanctiæ Crucis, Wood of the Holy Cross, believing it helps the falling sickness, apoplexy and palsy very speedily, not only to be inwardly taken, but to be hung at their neck.

MODERN USES: Controversially, extracts of mistletoe are used in injectable proprietary products in Europe for the supportive treatment of cancer, with a higher dose used for malignant tumors. In lower-dose intradermal injections, it has been used to treat joint inflammation. Obviously, these uses are not amenable to self-medication. As a tea, the herb is used as a folk medicine for mild hypertension. CAUTION: May cause allergies in some individuals. The translucent white berries have reportedly caused poisoning in children. Avoid ingestion.

 

MONEYWORT

(LYSIMACHIA NUMMULARIA)

Herb Twopence

DESCRIPTION: The common Moneywort run[s] upon the ground two or three feet long or more, set with leaves two at a joint, which are almost round. At the joints with the leaves come forth one [or two] yellow flowers.

PLACE: It grows plentifully in moist [shaded grounds and fields throughout Europe; naturalized and weedy in North America].

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: Venus owns it. Moneywort is singularly good to stay all fluxes in man or woman, whether they be lasks [diarrhea], bloody-fluxes [dysentery], bleeding inwardly or outwardly, or the weakness of the stomach that is given to casting. It is very good also for the ulcers or excoriations of the lungs, or other inward parts. It is exceedingly good for all wounds, either fresh or green, to heal them speedily, and for all old ulcers that are of spreading natures. For all which purposes the juice of the herb, or the powder drank in water wherein hot steel hath been often quenched; or the decoction of the green herb in wine or water drank, or used to the outward place, to wash or bathe them, or to have tents dipped therein and put into them, are effectual.

MODERN USES: Moneywort is a folk medicine used as an astringent for the treatment of diarrhea and dysentery. Also used topically for the treatment of wounds. Seldom used today.

 

MOONWORT

(BOTRYCHIUM LUNARIA)

DESCRIPTION: [A small fern that] rises up usually but with one dark green, thick and flat leaf, with leaflets, resembling therein a half-moon.

PLACE: It grows on hills and heaths. [A widespread plant found in mountainous regions nearly worldwide; found in the Rocky Mountains and cooler regions of North America, Europe, Asia, and South America.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: The Moon owns the herb. Moonwort is cold and drying more than Adder’s Tongue, and is therefore held to be more available for all wounds both inward and outward. The leaves boiled in red wine, and drank, stay the immoderate flux of women’s courses, and the whites. It also stays bleeding, vomiting, and other fluxes. It helps all blows and bruises, and to consolidate all fractures and dislocations. It is good for ruptures, but is chiefly used, by most with other herbs, to make oils or balsams to heal fresh or green wounds (as I said before) either inward or outward, for which it is excellently good.

Moonwort is an herb which (they say) will open locks, and unshod such horses as tread upon it: This some laugh to scorn, and those no small fools neither; but country people, that I know, call it Unshoe the Horse. Besides I have heard commanders say, that on White Down in Devonshire, there were found thirty horse shoes, pulled off from the feet of the Earl of Essex’s horses, being there drawn up in a body, many of them being but newly shod, and no reason known. The herb described usually grows upon heaths.

MODERN USES: Moonwort is an obscure folk medicine, used internally much like Culpeper describes for the treatment of diarrhea, and externally for wounds or sores.

 

MOTHERWORT

(LEONURUS CARDIACA)

DESCRIPTION: This hath a hard, square, stalk, rising three or four feet high, whereon grow leaves on each side, as if it were rough or crumpled, and [toothed] deeply divided. The flowers are of a red or purple colour.

PLACE: It grows only in gardens in England. [Found in fields and wastelands throughout most of Europe and western Asia; naturalized throughout North America.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: Venus owns the herb, and it is under Leo. There is no better herb to take melancholy vapours from the heart, to strengthen it, and make a merry, cheerful, blithe soul than this herb. It may be kept in a syrup or conserve; therefore the Latins called it Cardiaca. Besides, it makes women joyful mothers of children, and settles their wombs as they should be, therefore we call it Motherwort. It is held to be of much use for the trembling of the heart, and faintings and swoonings; from whence it took the name Cardiaca. The powder thereof, to the quantity of a spoonful, drank in wine, is a wonderful help to women in their sore travail, as also for the suffocating or risings of the mother, and for these effects, it is likely it took the name of Motherwort with us. It also provokes urine and women’s courses, cleanses the chest of cold phlegm, oppressing it, kills worms in the belly. It is of good use to warm and dry up the cold humours, to digest and disperse them that are settled in the veins, joints, and sinews of the body, and to help cramps and convulsions.

MODERN USES: Traditionally, motherwort is used as a mild sedative, antispasmodic, cardiotonic, diuretic, hypotensive, and astringent. Used to treat menstrual irregularities, nervous heart complaints, and menopausal symptoms, among other ailments. Related species are commonly used in traditional Chinese medicine to regulate the menses, promote good blood circulation, and regulate the heart. Motherwort is considered antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, immunomodulatory, and diuretic. European and Asian species share the alkaloids leonurine, stachydrine, and leonurinine.

 

MUGWORT

(ARTEMISIA VULGARIS)

DESCRIPTION: Common Mugwort hath diverse leaves lying upon the ground, very much divided, or cut deeply in, of a dark green colour on the upper side, and very hoary white underneath. The stalks rise to be four or five feet high, with small, pale, flowers like buttons.

PLACE: It grows plentifully [in wastelands throughout Europe and Asia; weedy and widely naturalized in North America and elsewhere].

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: This is an herb of Venus, therefore maintains the parts of the body she rules, remedies the diseases of the parts that are under her signs, Taurus and Libra. Mugwort is with good success put among other herbs that are boiled for women to apply the hot decoction to draw down their courses, to help the delivery of the birth, and expel the after-birth. As also for the obstructions and inflammations of the mother. It breaks the stone, and opens the urinary passages where they are stopped. The juice thereof made up with Myrrh, and put under as a pessary, works the same effects, and so does the root also. Being made up with hog’s grease into an ointment, it takes away wens and hard knots and kernels that grow about the neck and throat, and eases the pains about the neck more effectually, if some Field Daisies be put with it. The herb itself being fresh, or the juice thereof taken, is a special remedy upon the overmuch taking of opium. Three drams of the powder of the dried leaves taken in wine, is a speedy and the best certain help for the sciatica. A decoction thereof made with Chamomile and Agrimony, and the place bathed therewith while it is warm, takes away the pains of the sinews, and the cramp.

MODERN USES: Like wormwood (Artemisia absinthium) mugwort has been used to expel roundworms and threadworms. Traditionally used for the treatment of nervous conditions, restlessness, anxiety, lack of sleep, and menstrual difficulties. Widely used in Asian traditional medicine systems as moxa (dried, compressed leaves burned on the skin to activate acupuncture points). The plant and its extracts have antioxidant, antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, anthelmintic, and mildly sedative effects. CAUTION: A source of airborne allergies; may cause contact dermatitis.

 

MULBERRY

(MORUS ALBA)

The Mulberry Tree

This is so well known where it grows, that it needs no description.

PLACE: [Native to Central Asia, mulberry has been cultivated since ancient times and occurs throughout Asia, much of Europe, temperate Africa, North America, and South America.]

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: Mercury rules the tree, therefore are its effects variable as his are. The Mulberry is of different parts; the ripe berries, by reason of their sweetness and slippery moisture, opening the body, and the unripe binding it, especially when they are dried, and then they are good to stay fluxes, lasks [diarrhea], and the abundance of women’s courses. The bark of the root kills the broad worms in the body. The juice, or the syrup made of the juice of the berries, helps all inflammations or sores in the mouth, or throat, and palate of the mouth when it is fallen down. The juice of the leaves is a remedy against the biting of serpents, and for those that have taken aconite. The leaves beaten with vinegar, are good to lay on any place that is burnt with fire. A decoction made of the bark and leaves is good to wash the mouth and teeth when they ache. If the root be a little slit or cut, and a small hole made in the ground next thereunto, in the Harvest-time, it will give out a certain juice, which being hardened the next day, is of good use to help the tooth-ache, to dissolve knots, and purge the belly. The leaves of Mulberries are said to stay bleeding at the mouth or nose, or the bleeding of the piles, or of a wound, being bound unto the places. A branch of the tree taken when the moon is at the full, and bound to the wrists of a woman’s arm, whose courses come down too much, doth stay them in a short space.

MODERN USES: Mulberry leaf, mulberry root bark, mulberry twigs, and mulberry fruit, just as Culpeper enumerates from his era, are today all separate drugs in traditional Chinese medicine. The leaf is used in prescriptions for upper respiratory tract infections, dry coughs, headaches, and eye inflammations. Mulberry root bark is used to treat asthma and as a diuretic. The twigs are used for rheumatism and arthritis to help reduce aching and numbness of joints. The fruits are used to nourish the blood and to treat insomnia, diabetes, and thirst. Various pharmacological activities, including anti-inflammatory, antidiabetic, and antioxidant effects, are attributed to this plant.

 

MULLEIN

(VERBASCUM THAPSUS)

DESCRIPTION: Common Mullein has many fair, large, woolly white leaves, lying next the ground, somewhat longer than broad. The stalk rises up to be four or five feet high [the second year], set together in a long spike, [with yellow five-petaled flowers].

PLACE: It grows by way-sides and lanes, in many places [originating in the Balkans and southeast Europe, now found in wastelands, gravelly soils, and roadsides as a weed throughout most of the world].

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: It is under the dominion of Saturn. A small quantity of the root given in wine, is commended by Dioscorides, against lasks [diarrhea] and fluxes of the belly. The decoction hereof drank, is profitable for those that are bursten, and for cramps and convulsions, and for those that are troubled with an old cough. The decoction thereof gargled, eases the pains of the toothache. And the oil made by the often infusion of the flowers, is of very good effect for the piles. The decoction of the root in red wine or in water, (if there be an ague) wherein red-hot steel hath been often quenched, doth stay the bloody-flux [dysentery]. The same also opens obstructions of the bladder and kidneys. A decoction of the leaves hereof, and of Sage, Marjoram, and Chamomile flowers, and the places bathed therewith, that have sinews stiff with cold or cramps, doth bring them much ease and comfort. Three ounces of the distilled water of the flowers drank morning and evening for some days together, is said to be the most excellent remedy for gout. The juice of the leaves and flowers being laid upon rough warts, as also the powder of the dried roots rubbed on, doth easily take them away, but doth no good to smooth warts. The powder of the dried flowers is an especial remedy for those that are troubled with the belly-ache, or the pains of the colic. The decoction of the root, and so likewise of the leaves, is of great effect to dissolve the tumours, swellings, or inflammations of the throat. The seed and leaves boiled in wine, and applied, draw forth speedily thorns or splinters gotten into the flesh, ease the pains, and heal them also. The seed bruised and boiled in wine, and laid on any member that has been out of joint, and newly set again, takes away all swelling and pain thereof.

MODERN USES: The flowers of mullein are used in tea as a soothing expectorant for congestion of the upper respiratory tract. When soaked in olive oil, the flowers are a popular herbal treatment for earache. The leaves are used in numerous cough and bronchial herbal preparations. Both the flowers and leaves contain soothing mucilage, along with various active constituents such as iridoids, saponins, and flavonoids. Mullein has anti-oxidant, antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, and liver-protective activity.

 

MUSTARD

(BRASSICA RAPA)

DESCRIPTION: Our common Mustard hath large and broad rough leaves, very much jagged with uneven and unorderly gashes, somewhat like turnip leaves, but less and rougher. The stalk rises to be more than a foot high [with] diverse yellow flowers one above another at the tops, after which come small rough pods [with] yellowish seed, sharp, hot, and biting upon the tongue.

PLACE: This grows with us in gardens only, and other manured places.

GOVERNMENT AND VIRTUES: It is an excellent sauce for such whose blood wants clarifying, and for weak stomachs, being an herb of Mars, but naught for choleric people, though as good for such as are aged, or troubled with cold diseases. Aries claims something to do with it, therefore it strengthens the heart, and resists poison. Let such whose stomachs are so weak they cannot digest their meat, or appetite it, take of Mustard-seed a dram, Cinnamon as much, and having beaten them to powder, and half as much Mastic in powder, and with gum Arabic dissolved in rose-water, make it up into troches, of which they may take one of about half a dram weight an hour or two before meals; let old men and women make much of this medicine, and they will either give me thanks, or shew manifest ingratitude. Mustard seed hath the virtue of heat, discussing, ratifying, and drawing out splinters of bones, and other things of the flesh. It is of good effect to bring down women’s courses, for the falling-sickness or lethargy, drowsy forgetful evil, to use it both inwardly and outwardly, to rub the nostrils, forehead and temples, to warm and quicken the spirits; for by the fierce sharpness it purges the brain by sneezing, and drawing down rheum [watery discharge] and other viscous humours, which by their distillations upon the lungs and chest, procure coughing, and therefore, with some, honey added thereto, doth much good therein. The seed taken either by itself, or with other things, either in an electuary or drink, doth mightily stir up bodily lust, and helps the spleen and pains in the sides, and gnawings in the bowels; and used as a gargle draws up the palate of the mouth, being fallen down; and also it dissolves the swellings about the throat, if it be outwardly applied. Being chewed in the mouth it oftentimes helps the toothache. The outward application hereof upon the pained place of the sciatica, eases the pains, as also gout, and other joint aches; and is much and often used to ease pains in the sides or loins, the shoulder, or other parts of the body. Upon the plying thereof to raise blisters, and cures the disease by drawing it to the outward parts of the body. It is also used to help the falling off of the hair. The seed bruised mixed with honey, and applied, or made up with wax, takes away the marks and black and blue spots of bruises, or the like, the roughness or scabbiness of the skin, as also the leprosy, and lousy evil. It helps also the crick in the neck. The distilled water of the herb, when it is in the flower, is much used to drink inwardly to help in any of the diseases aforesaid, or to wash the mouth when the palate is down, and for the disease of the throat to gargle, but outwardly also for scabs, itch, or other the like infirmities, and cleanses the face from morphew [blemishes], spots, freckles, and other deformities.

MODERN USES: Mustard seed is added to bathwater at about 1 percent by weight to stimulate circulation in arthritic hands or feet. The hot principles of mustard, known as glucosinolates, become pungent in the presence of the enzyme myrosinase. In mustards or mustard oil, these hot or pungent components can be irritating. Mustard and its preparations are used for rheumatism and arthritis, and in small quantities as an appetite and digestive stimulant. CAUTION: Prolonged exposure to mustard plaster or wraps can cause chemical burns and blistering.