Culpeper's complete herbal ... To which are ... annexed his English physician enlarged, and Key to [Galen's Method of] physic ... to which is also added ... receipts selected from the author's Last legacy / Nicholas Culpeper.

Nicholas Culpeper

Date:: 1814

Credit: Culpeper's complete herbal ... To which are ... annexed his English physician enlarged, and Key to [Galen's Method of] physic ... to which is also added ... receipts selected from the author's Last legacy / Nicholas Culpeper. Source: Wellcome Collection.

52/500 (page 32)

$Mars, being of a gallant cleansing and opening quality. The decoction of the root made with wine opens obstructions, provokes urine, helps to expel gravel and the stone, the stranguarj and women’s courses, also the yellow jaundice and the head-ache : And with some honey or suoar put thereunto, cleanses the breast of phlegm, and the chest of such clammy humours gathered therein. The decoction of the root drank, and a poultice made of the berries and leaves applied, are effectual in knitting and consolidating broken bones or parts out of joint. The common way of using it, is to boil the root of it, and parsley and fennel and smallage in white wane, and drink the decoction, adding the like quan- tity of grass-root to them: The more of the root you boil, the stronger will the de- coction be; it works no ill effects, yet I ho})e you have wit enough to give the strongest decoction to the strongest bodies. BROOM, AND BROOM-RAPE. To spend time in Avriting a description hereof is altogether needless, it being so generally used by all the good housewives almost through this land to SAveep their houses Avith, and therefore very Avell knoAvn to all sorts of people. The broom-rape springs up in many places from the roots of the broom (but more often in fields, as by hedge-sides and on heaths.) The stalk whereof is of the bigness of a finger or thumb, above two feet high, having a shew of leaves on them, and many floAvers at the top, of a reddish yelloAV colour, as also the stalks and leaves are. P/«ce.] They groAv in many places of this land commonly, and as commonly spoil all the land they groAV in. Th«e.] They floAver in the Summer months, and give their seed before Winter. Government and virtues.^ The juice or decoction of the young branches, or seed, _ ■' I or the poAvder of the seed taken in drink, j purges doAvnAA^ards, and draAvs phlegmatic I and watery humours from the joints, where- j by it helps the dropsy, gout, sciatica, and \ pains of the hips and joints; it also piKD- 1 yokes strong vomits, and helps the pains of I the sides, and SAvelling of the spleen, i cleanses also the reins or kidneys and blad- \ der of the stone, provokes urine abundantly, and hinders the growing again of the stone ii in the body. The continual use of the poAvder of the leaves and seed doth cure ii the black jaundice. The distilled AAater of ii the flowers is profitable for all the same ii purposes: it also helps surfeits, and alters i the fit of agues, if three or four ounces il thereof, with as much of the water of the i lesser centuary, and a little sugar put there- ii in, be taken a little before the fit comes, and the party be laid doAvn to sAveat in his i; bed. The oil or Avater that is drawn from :i the end of the green sticks heated in the I fire, helps the tooth-ache. The juice of : young branches made into an ointment of i old hog’s grease, and anointed, or the young i branches bruised and heated in oil or hog’s I grease, and laid to the sides pained by } wind, as in stiches, or the spleen, ease ; them in once or twice using it. The same : boiled in oil is the safest and surest medicine i to kill lice in the head or body of any; i and is an especial remedy for joint aches, \ and SAVollen knees, that come by the falling j doAvn of humours. \ The BROOM RAPE olso is not without its 1 virtues. \ \ i The decoction thereof in wine, is thought I to be as effectual to void the stone in the \ kidney or bladder, and to provoke urine, 1 as the Broom itself. The juice thereof is a singular good help to cure as Avell green i; wounds, as old and filthy sores and malig- i; nant ulcers. The insolate oil, Avherein there 1 has been three or four repetitions of infusion I of the top stalks, Avith flowers strained and * A,$