Lactuca sativa
HRB-0172Entry “LETTUCE” 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 Moon, by Culpeper. A traditional astrological assignment, kept apart from the modern evidence; it is not a finding.
It helps digestion, quenches thirst, increases milk in nurses, eases griping pains in the stomach or bowels, that come of choler.
not only represses the heat and inflammations therein, but comforts and strengthens those parts, and also tempers the heat of urine.
Applied outwardly to the region of the heart, liver or reins, or by bathing the said places with the juice of distilled water, wherein some white Sanders, or red Roses are put;
but the use of Lettuce is chiefly forbidden to those that are short-winded, or have any imperfection in the lungs, or spit blood.
The juice of Lettuce mixed or boiled with Oil of Roses, applied to the forehead and temples procures sleep, and eases the headache proceeding of an hot cause:
It helps digestion, quenches thirst, increases milk in nurses, eases griping pains in the stomach or bowels, that come of choler.
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.