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Common name: Gentian
Flowering perennial common to alpine areas of central and southern Europe.
Traditional European herbology used the bitter root to strengthen the
digestive system when taken over a period of time. Used
for anorexia
and exhaustion from chronic disease, but primarily for digestive disorders
such as loss of appetite, fullness, and flatulence.
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"Gentian,
which is most used amongst us… They resist putrefactions, poison, and
a more sure remedy cannot be found to prevent the pestilence than
it is; it strengthens the stomach exceedingly, helps digestion, comforts
the heart, and preserves it against faintings and swoonings. The
powder
of the dry roots helps the biting of mad dogs and venomous beasts,
open obstructions of the liver, and restores an appetite for their
meat to
such as have lost it. The herb steeped in wine, and the wine drank,
refreshes such as be overweary with traveling, and grow lame in their
joints, either by cold or evil lodgings; it helps stitches, and griping
pains in the sides; is an excellent remedy for such as are bruised
by falls; it provokes urine and the terms exceedingly, therefore
let it
not be given to women with child. The same is very profitable for
such as are troubled with cramps and convulsions, to drink the decoction.
Also they say it breaks the stone, and helps ruptures most certainly:
it is excellent in all cold diseases, and such as are troubled with
tough phlegm, scabs, itch, or any fretting sores and ulcers; it is
an
admirable remedy to kill the worms."
From The
English Physitian (1652) by Nicholas Culpeper
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