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FUMITORY

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Originally appearing in Volume V11, Page 301 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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FUMITORY , in See also:

botany, the popular name for the See also:British See also:species of Fumaria, a genus of small, branched, often climbing See also:annual herbs with much-divided leaves and racemes of small See also:flowers. The flowers are tubular with a spurred' See also:base, and in the British species are See also:pink to purplish in See also:colour. They are weeds of cultivation growing in See also:fields and See also:waste places. F. capreolata climbs by means of twisting petioles. In past times fumitory was in esteem for its reputed cholagogue and other medicinal properties; and in See also:England, boiled in See also:water, See also:milk or whey, it was used as a cosmetic. The See also:root of the allied species (Corydalis See also:cave or tuberosa) is known as radix See also:aristolochia, and has been used medicinally for various cutaneous and other disorders, in doses of 10 to 30 grains. Some eleven alkaloids have been isolated from it. The herbage of Fumaria officinalis and F. racemosa is used in See also:China under the name of Tsze-hwa-ti-Zing as an application for glandular swellings, carbuncles and abscesses, and was formerly valued in See also:jaundice, and in cases of accidental swallowing of the See also:beard of See also:grain (see F. See also:Porter See also:Smith, Contrib. towards the See also:Mat. Medica . . . of China, p. 99, 1871).

The name fumitory, Latin fumus terrae, has been supposed to be derived from the fact that its juice irritates the eyes like See also:

smoke (see See also:Fuchs, De historic stir pium, p. 338, 1542); but The Grete Herball, cap. clxix., 1529, fol., following the De simplici See also:medicine of Platearius, fo. xciii. (see in See also:Nicolai Preepositi dispensatorium ad aromatarios, 1J36), says: " It is called Fumu.s terre fume or smoke of the erthe bycause it is engendred of a cours fumosyte rysynge See also:frome the erthe in grete quantyte lyke smoke: this See also:grosse or cours fumosyte of the erthe wyndeth and wryeth out: and by workynge of the ayre and sonne it turneth into this herbe.

End of Article: FUMITORY

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