Sow-Fennel, Or Hog’s-Fennel

Peucedanum officinale

HRB-0119Entry “SOW-FENNEL, OR HOG’S-FENNEL” in the 1850 textIn Culpeper’s 1652 first edition

Open in the Concordance

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.

Substance of concernFuranocoumarins: the juice on skin burns in sunlight.EFSA: 8-methoxy-peucedanin, peucedaninEFSA’s list of substances, not a danger rating. Checked 26 October 2026.

Historical correspondence. Ruled by Mercury, by Culpeper. A traditional astrological assignment, kept apart from the modern evidence; it is not a finding.

Culpeper’s claims about it: 7, under 7 headings

  1. CoughsCLM-000563
    The juice dissolved in wine, or put into an egg, is good for a cough, or shortness of breath, and for those that are troubled with wind in the body.
    QUO-000474Papers and the EMA’s verdict, in the Concordance
  2. CrampCLM-000623
    The juice of Sow-Fennel (saith Dioscorides, and Galen,) used with vinegar and rose water, or the juice with a little Euphorbium put to the nose, helps those that are troubled with the lethargy, frenzy, giddiness of the head, the falling sickness, long and inveterate head-aches, the palsy, sciatica, and the cramp, and generally all the diseases of the sinews, used with oil and vinegar.
    QUO-000510Papers and the EMA’s verdict, in the Concordance
  3. Dizziness of the HeadCLM-0022901850 index, p. 74
    The juice of Sow-Fennel (saith Dioscorides, and Galen,) used with vinegar and rose water, or the juice with a little Euphorbium put to the nose, helps those that are troubled with the lethargy, frenzy, giddiness of the head, the falling sickness, long and inveterate head-aches, the palsy, sciatica, and the cramp, and generally all the diseases of the sinews, used with oil and vinegar.
    QUO-000510Papers and the EMA’s verdict, in the Concordance
  4. The juice of Sow-Fennel (saith Dioscorides, and Galen,) used with vinegar and rose water, or the juice with a little Euphorbium put to the nose, helps those that are troubled with the lethargy, frenzy, giddiness of the head, the falling sickness, long and inveterate head-aches, the palsy, sciatica, and the cramp, and generally all the diseases of the sinews, used with oil and vinegar.
    QUO-000510Papers and the EMA’s verdict, in the Concordance
  5. The juice dissolved in wine, or put into an egg, is good for a cough, or shortness of breath, and for those that are troubled with wind in the body.
    QUO-000474Papers and the EMA’s verdict, in the Concordance
  6. UlcersCLM-001942
    yet the powder of the root cleanses foul ulcers, being put into them, and takes out splinters of broken bones, or other things in the flesh, and heals them up perfectly:
    QUO-001224Papers and the EMA’s verdict, in the Concordance
  7. WoundsCLM-002186
    as also, dries up old and inveterate running sores, and is of admirable virtue in all green wounds.
    QUO-001364Papers and the EMA’s verdict, in the Concordance

Source

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.