ANCHUSA TINCTORU. 
221 
hy%0V(Ttc, ah ciy%u, strangulo.* This species of Anchusa is a 
native of Montpellier, where it is cultivated in great abundance. 
It was introduced into Britain about the ;year 1596,t and cultivated 
by Mr. J. Sutherland in the year 1683 ; J it now forms an ornament 
in many of our gardens, but in this country the roots do not acquire 
the beautiful red colour of the foreign plants, on which their chief 
value depends. 
The root is perennial, long, round, fibrous, internally whitish, and 
covered externally with a dark purplish red coloured bark; the 
stem rises from eighteen to twenty-four inches in height, is round, 
rough, hairy, and branched ; the leaves grow alternate, are long, 
lanceolate, obtuse, hairy, and stand sessile on the stems; the flowers 
vary in colour from a purplish to a red, and terminate the 
branches in close clusters ; the calyx is persistent, and divided into 
five oblong, erect segments; the corolla is monopetalous, funnel- 
shaped, consisting of a cylindrical tube, (equal in length to the 
calyx) ; the limb is divided into five blunt segments, and closed at 
the centre by five small scaly leaflets ; the filaments are shorter 
than the tube of the corolla, and furnished with simple anthers ; 
the germens are four; the style is filiform, about the length of the 
filaments, and supports an obtuse notched stigma ; the seeds are 
four, of an irregular form, and lodged within the calyx. This 
species of alkanet flowers from June until October. 
Qualities, &c. The fresh root has a faint odour, which it 
loses entirely by drying 5 its taste is somewhat astringent and bitter 
when fresh, but the dried root is insipid. To water, (either hot or 
cold) this root gives only a brownish hue ; to alcohol, ether, spirit 
of turpentine, oils and fat, it imparts a fine deep red colour ; the 
watery infusion turns black by the addition of sulphate of iron, and 
a copious dark coloured precipitate is thrown down from the infusion 
by the sulphate of zinc. 
Medical Properties and Uses. Formerly the alkanet root 
was recommended as an useful astringent in many diseases, but it is 
now totally disregarded, and the chief use to which it is applied is 
for colouring oils and unguents ; it is also used by cabinet makers 
for staining mahogany and other wood. 
Off". The Roots. 
* Vide Bod. in Theophrast. p. 835. 
T Hort. Cant. 
t Sutherland's Hort. Edin. 24, No. 7. 
