The Prepper Broadcasting Network - Herbal Medicine for Preppers: Potentilla and Cinquefoil

Starting point is 00:00:00 Hey y'all, welcome this week's podcast. Today, we are going to talk about an herb called Potentilla. Now, Potentilla is a member of the Rose family. And there's a sort of an abbreviation that some herbalists use called Yarfa, Y-A-R-F-A. What that stands for is yet another Rose family astringent. And what that means is that all members of the Rose family. have astringent qualities in varying degrees. I mean, the rose family is huge. The rose family includes blackberries. It includes apple trees. It includes geraniums.

Starting point is 00:00:42 I mean, you'd be amazed what all is in the rose family. But depending on the species of potentilla used, it can be extremely astringent. Tormenta Potentilla erecta. Okay, I should clarify that. Potentilla is the Latin name potentilla erecta that means upright and the folk name European mostly used but you'll see it in the old herb books is tormental T-O-R-M-E-M-T-I-L but Potentilla Potentilla contains more tannin than oak bark and we've talked before how oak bark is like one of the most tannic substances on the face of the earth right

Starting point is 00:01:24 I can help stop bleeding, either externally or internally, it's to stop diarrhea, like very few other things possible. Really, very astringent. Potentilla is actually more astringent than oak bark. So this makes it just extremely good. It's just a nice little garden flower. You can grow it in pots. You can grow it in your garden in a HOA or POA. People just think it's a nice little flower.

Starting point is 00:01:52 This makes it absolutely a solid. essential herbal medicine to have on hand for first aid purposes. So Pondilla has been used for centuries. Diaz-Corti, he's about 2,000 years, wrote about it. Let's see, he describes it. And he mentions the flowers, pale, white, or yellowish like gold. It's a very pretty flower. It does tend to like moist places. In nature, it grows by rivers and creeks and such. So if you've got a a little spot in your garden. It's a little bit wetter, a little more shade, be a really good place to put it, or keep it in pots

Starting point is 00:02:27 and sit up a porch where it's going to get filtered sunlight and just water it regularly. So he said a decoction of the root reduced by one-third by simmering. So if you were like simmering two cups, well, a pint. Let's say you were simmering a pint of water with a handful of potent,

Starting point is 00:02:51 You boil it down to a decoction until one-third of the water is steamed off, as all that means. It's not a very exact measurement. He said that after it was done, held in the mouth is able to relieve toothache. That's the astringency is going to pull down the inflammation very markedly. Doesn't necessarily get rid of a broken or rotten tooth at all, but it will pull that swelling down, so it takes the pressure off the nerves, and that's how that that works. I said uses a mouth wash. It stops rotten ulcers in the mouth and it does have some antiseptic properties by the way. So it could help that tooth as well. But once the tooth is that damaged, it's, you know, it's going to have to go, bottom line. Let's see. Gargled,

Starting point is 00:03:40 it relieves roughness of the throat, so sore throat, scratchy throat. And again, it's just stringing that tissue. It's pulling the swelling out. Taking as a drink, it helps flowing bowels, dysentery, arthritis and sciatica. Pounded finely, boiled in vinegar and applied, it restrains herpes, viral skin disease, of course, and dissolve swellings, goyters, hardened places, edema, aneurysm, suppurations, eryspilus, which is a skin inflammation, and conjunctivitis. It heals skin lesions and psoriasis. The juice from the tender root is good for disorder, that means fresh root, not dried, is good for disorders of the liver and lungs and for deadly poisons. The leaves taken in a drink with honey water or diluted wine and a little

Starting point is 00:04:23 pepper are good for recurrent fevers. The leaves of four little branches are used for paroxysms at spasms every fourth day, three, four paroxysms of every third day, and one for paroxysms every day. Okay. I think he's talking there about malarial type fevers, which can cause, they come on regularly like that episodically. They'll either come on every two days, every three days, every fourth day, such as that, and they do cause tremors and shaking because it's a very violent fever.

Starting point is 00:04:59 So I don't think he's necessarily talking, you know, epilepsy in that case. But then he says they do help epilepsy taken as a drink for 30 days. And three glasses of the juice of leaves taken as a drink for some days, soon cures jaundice. By the way, this last week on my other podcast, Southern Appalachian Earbs podcast, I interviewed Zuzu Arms, who has an herbal and

Starting point is 00:05:23 natural healing center down in Georgia. She's a great author, very well known in the world of herbal medicine. She actually was diagnosed with epilepsy as a young lady and healed herself with natural medicine. We get into that a lot. And she's really big on Gabba. If you have epilepsy or you know someone who does definitely listen to that podcast, Southern Appalachian Herbs podcast. Yeah, it was a great interview. I wish the sound quality had been a little bit better. I did everything I could to clean it up.

Starting point is 00:05:57 I hate doing Zoom interviews because whenever I log into Zoom, it resets my microphone settings. Well, I have my microphone settings set specifically for what I need for my podcast. Well, it goes in there and it turns this. down and alters it I don't even know what all it does but I have to reset them every time I get off of a Zoom call and the recording was it sounded like I was talking on the phone I mean it's not bad but it's not as clear as I like so that annoyed me but you can still hear everything fine it's just you know sounds like

Starting point is 00:06:31 I'm we're on the phone and it's a really great information she talked about how she cured her epilepsy how she cured her scoliosis even. That was really interesting as well and a lot of other really good topics. Let's see. He says, taken as a drink for some day, soon cures jaundice. That's the juice of the leaves. Applied with salt and honey, they heal wounds and fistula's. Taken as a drink or else applied, it helps those who are broken in the foreskin or hymen. Again, we're talking the estrangeancy, just going to kind of tighten things up and reduce inflammation and stops flows of blood. It is cut for washings, discharge of blood and purification.

Starting point is 00:07:20 He says, this is an interesting old folklore. He says, if anyone carries sycophil around his body, he remains without suffering. It helps the eyes, tumors, possibly goiters, there's a note there, hardened tonsils, the uvula, sores under the tongue, the joints, disorders of the nerves, the teeth, scabies, or other itchy skin conditions, especially caused by pernicious famine, as well as drawing down the afterbirth. A decoction pour on the hands is excellent against fears and enchantments. Therefore, gather the herb when the moon increases and the time of the sun arising. Yeah, that's not mine. I have no idea about that. But it is also, well, we don't need to get under all the names that were used commonly 2,000 years ago. But Potentilla or

Starting point is 00:08:11 Tormental has a long history of use in German folk medicine. St. Hildegard von Bingen, right in around 1100 described Tormento as a cold herb. She says its coldness is good for a healthy person and prevails against fevers which arise from noxious food. Take Tormental and cooking in wine with a little honey at it, strain it through a cloth, and drink it frequently at night on an empty stomach and you will become well. Father Johann Kunzel, writing about 1890 or so, well, no, he was, he was Swiss more around 1900 and 1920, but he was Swiss herbalist, stated that Potentilla erecta was his best remedy for diarrhea. Potentilla is also an ingredient in the Swedish bitters. Let me have a sip of water here. But Father Nape, who was writing about the 1890s,

Starting point is 00:09:02 used potentilla. He just called it silverweed. I'm not going to pronounce the German name he gave for it. Okay, I'll try. Just give your Germans a laugh anyway. Gonsfingery kraut? Gonsfingi kraut. There we go. I have no idea.

Starting point is 00:09:21 Implies where the geese like to be. So I guess it means it's a herb that goose like to eat. Geese like to eat. And that's true. You know, it's a waterside plant, and it is one favorite by geese. It's found in the vicinity of houses on commons and along the roads. People have named it after its mode of operating cramp herb.

Starting point is 00:09:41 Tea made from silverweed is an excellent remedy in attacks of cramp in the stomach and abdomen or elsewhere, even in cases of tetanus. Insofar as this can be worked upon, this little herb renders very good service. At the commencement of the tack, or better still, when symptoms of the cramp first appear, the patient should be given three times daily very warm milk as warm as possible, in which such herbs, as much as can be taken with three fingers, have been boiled as for tea. A greater effect may be obtained if at the same time as the tea has taken a poultice is made of the boiled herb and laid upon the afflicted part.

Starting point is 00:10:18 No mother of a family should omit to gather and dry a sufficient supply of such herbs. She knows herself how painful such frequently occurring spasmodic attacks are and how it gives still greater pain if she sees her dear ones suffering without being able to help them. In other words, good for menstrual cramps. Brother Aloysius used two potentillas, potentilla reptans and potentilla tormentilla. Reptans means spreading. And that's the one not commonly called synchofoil.

Starting point is 00:10:47 I probably should have cleared that up before. Potentilla will often be called tormental or synchofoid. They're both species of potentilla. So of the reptans or synchofoil, he said, The root decoction is good for fixing loose teeth and for toothaches. Leaves used for blood spitting, leukemia, stomach and intestinal cramps, bleeding, gravel, repress menstruation, dysentery jaundice, and alleviates infections of the kidney bladder and bleeding gums. Leaf tea is also used as an eyewash and for ulcerated or separating sores.

Starting point is 00:11:21 When steeped or boiled and milk taken hot, sink of foil was especially highly praised for cramps of the heart and chest. And of tormentor, he said, used for heavy bloods. eating, chronic diarrhea, blood spitting, alters from scurvy, and to quench thirst for diabetics, heavy menstruation, hematuria, internal sores, bedwetting, and urinary incontinence. Yes, this is actually an old folk remedy for bedwetting because it would kind of tighten up the tissue of the urinary tract. The Ashkenazi Jews, who brought much of knowledge of herbs to Central Europe, used potentilla as serena in their medicine, according to Deacherich Cohen and Adam C. said in folk medicine the whole plant decoction was employed in the treatment of fever in some towns I cannot pronounce like in Ukraine and Poland and parts of Germany

Starting point is 00:12:10 what they used to call the pale that was the Ashkenazi Jewish settlement in Corristin the I got that one Corristin that's an easy one the decoction released stomach ailments diarrhea and bloody diarrhea and in Annapol a midwife bathed infants suffering from indigestion and a decoction of the whole plant. The other one was something like Chavarits to Manana. I have no idea what that has pronounced that. A decoction prepared from a combination of silverweed,

Starting point is 00:12:41 Potentilla and Serena, a type of clover, D-N-I-E-P-E-R clover, I'm not sure about that. And Meadow Crane Spill, that's geranium, was a full killer's remedy in anapole for stomach ailments that caused elevated temperature. In Cherkaw, the plant decoction was used for chest diseases and tuberculosis. Same decoction was given as a sedative in Leighton, in somewhere I cannot pronounce.

Starting point is 00:13:08 The same remedy was used both externally and internally for epilepsy, which echoes the plants used in ancient grease. A decoction made from Ereclamatous, silverweed, and comfrey, plus the leaves of Gelder Rose was given by Folt Predictivis in the form of a steam bath for contusions rheumatic pains. The same formula was employed as a respiratory steam for headache relief in some town that starts with Z and V together. So forget that. I did have my friend from Ukraine helped me when I was writing this book to get some of the pronunciations down. But they never were pronounced like they were spelled. So I gave up on it. Anyway, the coxion of the plant was washed over affected areas to cure rash and pimples in someplace I can't pronounce.

Starting point is 00:13:54 An exact folk remedy was used in contemporary Bristol, England. which I can pronounce. So for sores caused by a venereal disease, a similar decoction was given in Cherkoss. In the pale, the plant was used widely in the treatment of gynecological disorders. This mirrors a similar treatment in Russian folk medicine. Midwives made a coxure the whole plant that was drunk by women experiencing menstrual cramps.

Starting point is 00:14:16 And in, I guess, ritesiv, the plant steamed was applied to the abdomen of a woman in labor. The plant decoction was given to drink in case of complications after delivery and for the same purpose of steam treatment administered by pouring decoctions over hot stones was known in Boschlov. A decoction made of silverweed and medoflebein was given to women suffering from gynecological diseases in the town of Zidomere, maybe. Children who suffered from scrofia were bathed in a plant decoction while children and adults suffering from metabolic diseases were made to drink a similar decoction in Ulanov, somewhat similar to. practices in contemporary Russian folk medicine. In veterinary medicine, the plant was fed to cows to

Starting point is 00:15:02 increase lactation. Gerard, in the English tradition, Victorian England, wrote silverweed as wild tansy and also several types of sinkaf oil. So I kind of had to sort through and find out because it's not a tansy at all. But anyway, he said, it is moderately cold and drying almost to the third degree, so very drying or stringent. He said, Boiled in wine and drunk, Stopeth the Laskan bloody flux And all other flux of blood in man or a woman,

Starting point is 00:15:34 The same boiled in water, And that means diarrhea or bleeding, you know. The same boiled in water and salt, drunk, Dissolveth clotted and congealed blood, And such as are hurt with bruising With falling from some high place. The decoction hereof made in water cureth ulcers and cankras of the mouth if some honey and alum be added thereto into the boiling.

Starting point is 00:15:57 Wild tansy, or you actually mean synchof oil, hath many good virtues against the stone, inwards, inward wounds, and other wounds of the privy or secret parts, and closeth up all green and fresh wounds. The distilled water taketh away freckles, spots, and pimples of the face and sunburning. They're real big in England of keeping their skin real pale. They didn't like freckles. but the herb laid to infuse or steep in white wine is far better but the best of all is to steep it in strong white wine vinegar the face being often bathed or washed wherewith therewith whatever

Starting point is 00:16:31 let's see he goes on about various types of sink of foil they all have similar uses though and it really is kind of hard to know exactly which plant he's talking about some places he does say that the root boiled and vinegar is good against shingles and appeatheth the rage of fretting sores and cankreth ulcers. And he mentioned that it is reported that it cureth the quartan, tertian, and quotidian agus.

Starting point is 00:17:02 Again, that's malarial fever. So I was right at my supposition on that. He also mentions that the leaves used as a cure for epilepsy, so I don't know. So Coles Pepper narrowed things down a bit. He said of the silverweed, he describes it. We don't need to get into all that. Government and virtues. This plant is under Venus, which by which he means it's mostly a women's herb, and deserves to be much more known in medicine than it is. It is of the nature of Tansy.

Starting point is 00:17:36 The leaves are mildly astringent, dried and given in powder. They will frequently affect a cure in agues and intermittent fevers, usually a malarial type. The usual dose is a spoonful of the powder every three or four hours betwixt the fits. The roots are more stringent than the leaves and may be given in doses, well, larger doses, we go with that, in obstinate purging is attended with bloody stool and immoderate menstrual discharge. So again, he's saying it just dries things up. A strong infusion of the leaves stops in moderate bleeding of the piles and sweetened the little honey as an excellent gargle for sore throats. Then he talks about a strawberry sink of foil, and but again the uses are pretty much the same he does mention that the young leaves are that one are a good diuretic

Starting point is 00:18:28 now maud grieve um get talks a lot about potentilla and or tormental in her book and uh this is you know 1930 so i think we can kind of um kind of narrow things down a little bit let's see if she says anything different because uh it is considered one of the safest and most powerful of our native aromatic estringents and for its tonic properties, it has been termed English Saspirilla. At this point, it was in the official pharmacopoeia of England and the United States, actually. All parts of the plant are stringent, especially the red, woody rhizome. The name Tormentill is said to be derived from the Latin tormentum, which signifies such griping of the intestine as the herbs will serve to relieve. Likewise, twinges of toothache.

Starting point is 00:19:21 The plant is very astringing and has even been used in some places for tanning. Well, she says Thornton tells of a poor old man who made wonderful cures of ague, smallpox, whooping cough, etc. from an infusion of this herb and became so celebrated locally that Lord William Russell gave him a piece of ground in which to cultivate it, which he did, keeping it secret for a long. Now, modern use, let's see what plants for future says. The plant is considered to be one of the safest native estrangeants and is widely used in herbal medicine in the treatment of diarrhea, dysentery, sore throats, etc. The whole plant, and especially the root, is antibiotic, strongly astringent, hemistatic, hypoglycemic. That means it lowers blood sugar.

Starting point is 00:20:05 It is used in the treatment of diarrhea, dysentery, irritable bowel syndrome, colitis, alterative colitis, etc. externally the plant makes a good stiptic for cuts means stops bleeding and a strongly made decoction has been recommended as a wash for mouth ulcers infected gums piles or hemorrhoids and inflamed eyes extracts are used to treat the chaping of the anus and crack nipples the plant's effectiveness as a toothache remedy is undeniable and it has also been a benefit in treating bed wetting by children so obviously potentilla more than just a Yarfa. It would actually kind of be the king of Yarfas. So really good to have on hand.

Starting point is 00:20:50 If you've got some oak and you've got some potentilla, you can take care of a whole lot of disorders. And it's a very cheerful looking flower. I mean, if you can grow it, people are going to love it. So y'all have a good one. And I'll talk to you next time. The information of this podcast is not intended to diagnose or treat any disease or condition. Nothing I say or write has been evaluated or approved by the FDA.

Starting point is 00:21:20 I'm not a doctor. The U.S. government does not recognize the practice of herbal medicine, and there is no governing body regulating herbless. Therefore, I'm really just a guy who studies herbs. I'm not offering any advice. I won't even claim that anything I write or say is accurate or true. I can tell you what herbs have been traditionally used for. I can tell you my own experience and if I believe an herb has helped me.

Starting point is 00:21:41 I cannot nor would I tell you to do the same. If you use an herb anyone recommends, you are treating yourself. You take full responsibility for your health. Humans are individuals and no two are identical. What works for me may not work for you. You may have an allergy, a sensitivity, an underlying condition that no one else even shares and you don't even know about it. Be careful with your health.

Starting point is 00:22:04 By continuing to listen to my podcast or read my blog, you agree to be responsible for yourself to your own research, make your own choices, and not to blame me for anything ever.

The Prepper Broadcasting Network - Herbal Medicine for Preppers: Potentilla and Cinquefoil

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