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Ligusticum is a Chinese herb that is believed to promote
circulation and regulates energy, and to be good for post-natal abdominal pain, painful
abscesses, and headaches due to colds.
The ligusticum roots and fruit are aromatic and stimulant, and have been shown to have
diuretic and carminative action. In herbal medicine, ligusticum is used for disorders of
the stomach and feverish attacks, especially for cases of colic and flatulence in
children, its qualities being similar to those of Angelica in expelling flatulence,
exciting perspiration and opening obstructions. The leaves eaten as salad, or infused dry
as a tea, used to be accounted a good emmenagogue.
An infusion of the root was recommended by old writers for gravel, jaundice and urinary
troubles, and the cordial, sudorific nature of the roots and seeds caused their use to be
extolled in pestilential disorders (parasites). In the opinion of Culpepper, the working
of the seeds was more powerful than that of the root; he tells us that an infusion 'being
dropped into the eyes taketh away their redness or dimness. Ligusticum is highly
recommended to drink the decoction of the herb for agues. The distilled water is good for
quinsy if the mouth and throat be gargled and washed therewith. The decoction drunk three
or four times a day is effectual in pleurisy.
Several species of this umbelliferous genus are employed as domestic medicines. The root
of Ligusticum sinense, under the name of Kao-Pau, is largely used by the Chinese, and in
the northwestern United States the large, aromatic roots of Ligusticum Filicinum (OSHA
Colorado cough-root) are used to a considerable extent as stimulating expectorants.
Ligusticum is also known as:
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Ligusticum levisticum,
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Old English Lovage,
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Italian Lovage,
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Cornish Lovage,
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Kao-Pau
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