TURMERIC 437 



chemistry of its colouring matter is to be found in 

 Watt's Dictionary. 



Medicine. As a drug, turmeric is no longer used in 

 European medicine, except as a colouring matter. It is 

 extensively used in native medicine, especially in skin 

 disease, and as a powder for sores among the Malays. 

 Children with excessive perspiration are often covered 

 with the powdered rhizomes used in much the same way 

 as orris root is in England. Women after confinement 

 are often rubbed all over with it, and it is used largely 

 as a cosmetic. In Java, I have seen children on the 

 way to a circumcision ceremony so coated with turmeric 

 that they appeared entirely of a bright yellow colour, 

 giving them a most extraordinary appearance. 



It is recommended both in India and Malaya for 

 bruises, leech bites, and skin diseases, but so far as I 

 have seen in the case of sores, with more injurious than 

 beneficial effects. It is said to relieve pain in purulent 

 conjunctivitis, and to be beneficial burnt as a fumigation 

 in catarrh and Hysteria, and as powder with alum is 

 blown into the ear in chronic otorrhoea. 



OTHER SPECIES OF CURCUMA 



There are several other Curcumas which are more 

 or less cultivated and also wild in India and the Malay 

 region, and which are used for various purposes by the 

 natives, chiefly as drugs, dyes, and as starch producers, 

 but not as spices, and so need be no more than 

 mentioned. 



Curcuma Amada, Roxb., mango ginger, is used in 

 medicine and as a condiment and vegetable in Bengal. 



C. angustifolia, Koxb., East Indian arrowroot. 

 Cultivated for its starch. 



C. aromatica, Salisb., yellow zedoary. Cochin 

 turmeric, used as a dye and cosmetic and as a drug. 



C. coesia, Roxb., black zedoary. 



C. caulina, Gresham, and C. leucorrhiza, Roxb., and 

 other spices are used to make a form of arrowroot. 



