| ANGELICA
ANGELICA ARCHANGELICA Our physicians ... blasphemously call Tansies or Heart's Ease, an herb for the Trinity, because it is of three colours, and they call a certain ointment, an ointment of the Apostles, because it consists of 12 ingredients. Alas! 1 am sorry for their folly and grieved at their blasphemy. God send them wisdom the rest of their age, for they have their share of ignorance already. Some call this an herb of the Holy Ghost; others more moderate called it Angelica, because of its angelical virtues. A perennial plant growing five or six feet (1.5 or 1.8 m) high with large leaves and flat heads of greenish-white flowers. Where to find it: A common garden plant, but it also grows wild, preferring humid habitats. Flowering time: It flowers from early to late summer. Astrology. It is a herb of the Sun in Leo. Gather it when he is there, the Moon applying to his good aspect. Let it be gathered either in his hour, or in the hour of Jupiter. Medicinal virtues: For all epidemical diseases caused by Saturn. It resists poison by defending and comforting the heart, blood and spirits. It doth the like against the plague. The root is taken in powder to the weight of half a dram (890 mg) at a time with some good treacle in Carduus water, and the party laid to sweat in his/her bed. The stalks and roots candied and eaten fasting are good preservatives in time of infection, and will warm and comfort a cold stomach. The root steeped in vinegar and a little of the vinegar taken fasting and the root smelled is good for the same purpose. A water distilled from the root, as steeped in wine and distilled, and drank two or three spoonfuls at a time easeth all pains and torments coming of cold and wind, and taken with some of the root in powder, helpeth the pleurisy, as also all other diseases of the lungs and breast, as coughs, phthisic and shortness of breath. A syrup of the stalks doth the like. It helps pains of the colic, the strangury and stoppage of the urine, procureth women's courses, and expelleth the afterbirth, openeth the stop- page of the liver and spleen, and briefly easeth and discusseth all windiness and inward swellings. The decoction drank before the fit of an ague, that they may sweat, if possible, before the fit comes will, in two or three tinies taking, rid it quite away. It helps digestion and is a remedy for a surfeit. The juice or the water dropped into the eyes or ears helps dimness of sight and deafness. The juice put into the hollow of the teeth easeth their pain. The root in powder, made up into a plaster and laid on the biting of mad dogs or any other venomous creature doth wonderfully help. The juice or water dropped into dead ulcers, or the powder of the root in want of either, doth cause them to heal quickly by covering the naked bones with flesh. The distilled water applied to places pained with gout or sciatica doth give a great deal of ease. Modern uses: Angelica is still widely used as an anti-dyspeptic, and for flatulence. For this an infusion is made from the bruised root or whole herb. Use 1 Oz (28 g) to 1 Pt (568 ml) of boiling water and administer in doses of 2 fl Oz (56 ml). An ointment can be made from the root by boiling it in paraffin wax and straining it before it cools. Use for minor skin problems and for rheumatic pain. The stems preserved with sugar are used as a confection. |
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