N. 0. P0LTG0NACE.E. 1073 



Use :— The roots are bruised, and, boiled in combination with 

 Catechu (Kath), used as a gargle for sore-gums. (Murray.) 



1055. Polygonum, aviculare Linn., h.f.b.i., v. 26. 



Vem. :— Indranee, bigbund, hunraj (Hind.) ; Kesru, banduke 

 iPb.); Miromati (Sans.) ; Machooti (Pb.) ; Drob (Kash.). 



Habitat : — Western Himalaya, from Kashmir to Kumaon ; 

 Rawal Pindee and the Deccan. 



A glabrous herb. Root mostly annual. Branches procumbent 

 or ascending, grooved, leafy. Leaves elliptic or elliptic-oblong 

 or lanceolate, obtuse flat, nerveless ; stipules shorter than the 

 internodes, hyaline, lacerate, many-nerved. Flowers axillary ; 

 pedicel short, pointed at the tip. Perianth obovoid, cleft to 

 near the base ; nut ovoid, obtusely 3-gonous, minutely rugosely 

 ' striolate. 



Uses : — In Chumba, the dried root is applied externally as an 

 anodyne, and officinal in Kashmir. (Stewart.) The seeds are 

 also said to be powerfully emetic and purgative. In Europe, 

 the whole plant is considered vulnerary and astringent. In the 

 Year Book of Pharmacy for 1874, an interesting account is 

 given of the reputed value of the decoction of the herb in 

 cases of: vesical calculus. A case is described in which a dose 

 of two tumblerfuls of the decoction is said to have been followed 



by almost immediate relief. 



" It was used by the ancients to arrest hemorrhage, the seeds were con- 

 sidered to be laxative and diuretic and to arrest defluxions. For burning 

 pains in the stomach the leaves were applied topically, and were used in the 

 form of a liniment for pains in the bladder and for erysipelas. The juice was 

 administered in fevers, tertian and quartan more particularly, in doses of two 

 cyathi, just before the paroxysms. Arabian physicians consider it to be cold 

 and dry, and reproduce what the Greeks have said concerning its medicinal 

 uses. 



In India, the plant is still used by the Hakims in the diseases named by 

 Dioscorides. 



In our own times Polygonum root has been used as a febrifuge in Algeria, 

 and has been reported upon as being an excellent remedy for chronic diarrhoea 

 and stone in the bladder. Its value has apparently been much exaggerated. 

 (J. R. Jackson, Amer. Journ. Phurm., 1873, p. 247.) 



In the Lancet, (1885, p. 658) it is said to be used in Russia, under the name 

 of Homeriana, as a popular remedy in lung affections. Dr. Rotschinin, who has 

 experimented with the drug, found it really valuable in several cases of 



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