Mugwort Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description
| Mugwort | ||||||||||||||
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| Artemisia vulgaris | ||||||||||||||
| Ref: ITIS 35505 |
'Mugwort\' or Common Wormwood (Artemisia vulgaris), is a species from the daisy family Asteraceae.
It is native to temperate Europe and Asia. It is a very common plant growing on nitrogenous soils, like weedy and uncultivated areas, such as waste places and roadsides, and in wooded areas and wetlands.
It is a tall herb growing up to 1.5 meters. The deep green leaves are pinnate, with white tomentose hairs on their underside. The erect stem has often a red-purplish tinge.
The rather small flowers (5 mm long) are radially symmetrical with many petals. The narrow and numerous capitula ( = flower heads) spread out in racemose panicles. Mugwort flowers from July to September.
Mugwort contains ethereal oils (such as cineole, or wormwood oil, and thujone), flavinoids, triterpenes, and coumarine derivatives.
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Mugwort is known from time immemorial as a remedy against fatigue and to protect travellers against evil spirits and wild animals. Roman soldiers put mugwort in their sandals to protect their feet against fatigue. Chewing some leaves will kill the fatigue and stimulate the nervous system.
Mugwort has an aromatic smell. Poor people used mugwort, sometimes mixed with other herbs, as a substitute for tobacco.
In bygone days it was also used to flavour beer, before the introduction of hops to beer.
Medicinally it was used as an anthelminthic, hence its name 'wormwood'.
Mugwort is much used in the practice of traditional Chinese medicine in a pulverized, aged, and recompounded form called moxa.
This is an Article on Mugwort. Page Contains Information, Facts Details or Explanation Guide About Mugwort Uses
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