Mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris) - 30 ml

Scientific Name: Artemisia vulgaris

Family: Asteraceae

Origin: Asia, Europe, North Africa

Color: Green

Aroma: Balsamic, Bitter

Properties: Sedative, expectorant, antiseptic

Quantity: 30 ml

Element Fire

Action: on the body

Mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris) is a perennial plant in the Asteraceae family, used to treat coughs due to its antiseptic and expectorant properties.

Properties of mugwort

The plant's roots have a sedative effect and can relax the nervous system, making them suitable for overstimulation and general fatigue.The flowering tops of mugwort contain essential oils (thujone, cineole, beta-thujone, alpha- and beta-pinene, borneol, neroli, myrcene), sesquiterpene lactones (vulgarine), and flavonoids, which give the plant antispasmodic properties (relieving muscle spasms in cases of menstrual pain and dysmenorrhea) and emmenagogue properties (regulating menstrual flow in cases of amenorrhea and irregular menstrual cycles).In addition to making it an effective antiseptic and expectorant remedy for coughs, the presence of essential oils in the plant complex also makes it useful against intestinal parasites, while its carminative properties are used for difficult digestion, especially in the formulation of natural liqueurs.

Description of the plant

A perennial shrubby plant, without stolons, with a faint "vermouth" odor. It has an upright, reddish, striated stem and is highly branched, growing 50 to 150 cm tall. The root is woody, short, and oblique.The leaves are alternate, lanceolate, incised-dentate, green, and glabrous above, whitish and tomentose below. The lower leaves have 2-4 dentate lobes on each side, are semi-clasping, and have a blade 4-6 mm wide at the apical portion, reduced to the rachis only at the basal portion, while the upper leaves are reduced and linear.The flowers are tubular and reddish-yellow, gathered in ovoid subsessile capitula in a large leafy pyramidal panicle, with a tomentose or densely woolly involucre and a glandular corolla. The fruits are oblong, pointed, smooth, glabrous achenes without pappus.Common mugwort (Artemisia absinthium) is also known and used in herbal medicine and belongs to the same family, and is used for digestive system disorders.

Mugwort habitat

Native to the temperate regions of Europe, Asia, and North Africa, it is also naturalized in North America. It grows from the plains to the foothills, along rivers and at the edges of fields.

Historical background

The name Artemisia comes from Artemis, the goddess in ancient Greek religion of the hunt, wild game, forests, archery, and virginity. Other names include wild wormwood, mugwort, and hemp-weed due to its superficial resemblance to hemp.According to Pliny the Elder, the name of the genus Artemisia comes from Artemis, the goddess in ancient Greek religion of the hunt and the moon, who presided over childbirth, because it was considered a plant useful for women's disorders. Other traditions derive the name Artemisia from the Greek word artemes, meaning "healthy" or "of good health". The specific term vulgaris indicates that it is a common species.The currently accepted scientific binomial, Artemisia vulgaris, was proposed by Carl von Linné (1707–1778), a Swedish biologist and writer considered the father of modern scientific classification of living organisms, in the publication "Species Plantarum".Mugwort is used in traditional Chinese and Japanese medicine for the preparation of moxa (from the Japanese moe kusa, meaning "burning herb"), a medicine obtained by grinding the plant in a mortar until a woolly paste is formed, with which balls or cones are prepared that, once placed on specific points on the skin (corresponding to acupuncture points), are burned.Also known as "devil-driving herb", it was harvested at the summer solstice, and several popular uses and traditions also attribute antiepileptic properties to the plant.

Use

Suitable for burning on a heat-resistant saucer with charcoal or in an incense burner with a sieve. The combustion process in an incense burner with a sieve is slower than with charcoal. The incense can easily be mixed with other varieties of incense.