26. Actaea spicata. Linn.

The medicinal plant Actaea spicata is a member of the Ranunculaceae (buttercup) family. This page includes its habitat, botanical descption, medicinal uses (eg., Ayurveda), chemical constituents and history of use in modern and ancient India.

Index in Flora of British India (Hooker): 1. 29.

Habitat:—Temperate Himalaya 6,000—10,000 ft. Simla, in Narkunda forest; from Bhutan to Hazara. Shady ravines of Jaunsar and Tehri-Garhwal.

Part used:—The root.

Botanical description:—A perennial, more or less pubescent herb,

Stems: 2-3 ft., erect, usually branched.

Leaves: 6 12 in., alternate pinnately compound, the pinnules often with 3 leaflets; leaflets ovate-lanceolate, pointed, often lobed, deeply and sharply toothed.

Flowers: regular, scarcely ¼ in. diam., white, crowded in short terminal racemes lengthening in fruit.

Sepals: 4, petal-like, concave, soon falling off.

Petals: 4, shorter than the sepals, clawed.

Stamens: numerous, longer than the sepals, anthers small.

Ovary: solitary, many-ovuled, stigma sessile, flat.

Fruit: a black ovoid, glabrous berry containing numerous small seeds. (Collett). The Baneberry of Britain. Hooker, f. and Thomson say that the berry is black in the European and Himalayan forms, white and red in the American.

Medicinal uses:—Stewart remarks regarding this plant:—“I have found no trace of its being used or dreaded” by the hill people on the Panjab Himalaya. It would be interesting to know whether this is correct; for it is curious that so useful a plant should have escaped the notice of the natives of India. Canadian doctors administer the root in snake-bite; and it is said to be attended with much success in the treatment of nervous diseases, rheumatic fever, chorea and lumbago. The berries were formerly used internally for asthma and scrofula, and externally for skin complaints. Baneberry Root is largely exported into Europe and used to adulterate the root of Helleborus niger. Mr. Frederick Stearns describes the root as violently purgative. (Watt.).