Flux-Weed

Descurainia sophia

HRB-0126Entry “FLUX-WEED” 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 concernThe seeds carry heart glycosides with a narrow safe range. Chinese medicine uses them as Ting Li Zi for heart failure, swelling and cough.EFSA: 1,8-cineole, gluconapin, helveticoside and 1 moreEFSA’s list of substances, not a danger rating. Checked 26 October 2026.

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

Culpeper’s claims about it: 5, under 5 headings, 1 where he says it harms or causes

  1. and is no less effectual for the same purpose than Plantain or Comfrey, and to restrain any other flux of blood in man or woman, as also to consoladate bones broken or out of joint.
    QUO-000137Papers and the EMA’s verdict, in the Concordance
  2. FluxCLM-0023151850 index, p. 78
    Both the herb and seed of Flux-weed is of excellent use to stay the flux or lask of the belly, being drank in water wherein gads of steel heated have been often quenched;
    QUO-001421Papers and the EMA’s verdict, in the Concordance
  3. StomachCLM-001596
    The juice thereof drank in wine, or the decoction of the herb drank, doth kill the worms in the stomach or belly, or the worms that grow in putrid and filthy ulcers, and made into a salve doth quickly heal all old sores, how foul or malignant soever they be.
    QUO-001055Papers and the EMA’s verdict, in the Concordance
  4. UlcersCLM-001948
    The juice thereof drank in wine, or the decoction of the herb drank, doth kill the worms in the stomach or belly, or the worms that grow in putrid and filthy ulcers, and made into a salve doth quickly heal all old sores, how foul or malignant soever they be.
    QUO-001055Papers and the EMA’s verdict, in the Concordance
  5. WormsCLM-002102
    The juice thereof drank in wine, or the decoction of the herb drank, doth kill the worms in the stomach or belly, or the worms that grow in putrid and filthy ulcers, and made into a salve doth quickly heal all old sores, how foul or malignant soever they be.
    QUO-001055Papers 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.