Melissa officinalis
HRB-0022Entry “BALM” in the 1850 textIn Culpeper’s 1652 first edition
Old claims, quoted verbatim: not medical advice. A warning sits above the claims and never hides them; no warning does not mean safe, only that no source here has flagged the plant.
Historical correspondence. Ruled by Jupiter, by Culpeper. A traditional astrological assignment, kept apart from the modern evidence; it is not a finding.
What it does, in Culpeper: Purge
It is very good to help digestion, and open obstructions of the brain, and hath so much purging quality in it (saith Avicen) as to expel those melancholy vapours from the spirits and blood which are in the heart and arteries, although it cannot do so in other parts of the body.
it is good to wash aching teeth therewith, and profitable for those that have the bloody flux.
It is very good to help digestion, and open obstructions of the brain, and hath so much purging quality in it (saith Avicen) as to expel those melancholy vapours from the spirits and blood which are in the heart and arteries, although it cannot do so in other parts of the body.
Seraphio says, it causes the mind and heart to become merry, and revives the heart, faintings and swoonings, especially of such who are overtaken in sleep, and drives away all troublesome cares and thoughts out of the mind, arising from melancholy or black choler;
It is good for the liver and spleen.
Seraphio says, it causes the mind and heart to become merry, and revives the heart, faintings and swoonings, especially of such who are overtaken in sleep, and drives away all troublesome cares and thoughts out of the mind, arising from melancholy or black choler;
It is very good to help digestion, and open obstructions of the brain, and hath so much purging quality in it (saith Avicen) as to expel those melancholy vapours from the spirits and blood which are in the heart and arteries, although it cannot do so in other parts of the body.
Let a syrup made with the juice of it and sugar (as you shall be taught at the latter end of this book) be kept in every gentlewoman’s house to relieve the weak stomachs and sick bodies of their poor sickly neighbours;
The leaves also, with a little nitre taken in drink, are good against the surfeit of mushrooms, helps the griping pains of the belly;
Used with salt, it takes away wens, kernels, or hard swelling in the flesh or throat;
Nicholas Culpeper, The Complete Herbal, a new edition (London: Thomas Kelly, 1850). Project Gutenberg eBook #49513. SRC-CUL-1850
Quotations are verbatim from the 1850 text, line breaks joined. Modern research and the European regulator’s verdict on each claim are on the Concordance page, kept apart from this historical record.