Indian Medicinal Plants

by Kanhoba Ranchoddas Kirtikar | 1918

A comprehensive work on Indian Botany including plant synonyms in various languages, habitat description and uses in traditional medicine, such as Ayurveda....

Notes on rasanjana (aqueous extract of Berberis aristata)

Rasanjana (sanskrit rasāñjana) is also known as Rasont or Rasaunt and refers to the extract of Berberis aristata (also see Berberis lycium).

The mode of preparation of the extract Rasôt, Rasvanti or Rasanjana is as follows:—Take 4 tolas of the Root cut into thin slices, boil it in half a seer of water, until reduced to a mass weighing 8 tolas; add to it eight tolas of goat’s milk, and boil again into a solid mass. This mass is Rasot—(Dr. T. M. Shah of Junagadh). The following powder is given as an effective remedy in dysenteric diarrhoea, in one dram doses. Take equal parts of Rasot, the bark and seeds. Holorrhena antidysenterica, (kuda) the flowers of Woodfordia floribunda (Dhaiti), and the root-tube of Aconitum heterophyllum (Atis) and ginger, and reduce them to an impalpable powder (Dr. Shah).

Dr. Shah recommends Rasot, opium, alum and Bal-Hirda (immature fruit of chebulic Myrobalan), rubbed on a stone, in equal parts, as an external application round inflamed eyes.

Mr. W. B. Lovegrove, Conservator of Forests, Jammu and Kashmir State, contributes an article on “Rasaunt” to The Indian Forester for May 1914 (pages 229-232), from which the following extracts are made:

Rasaunt is a brown extract prepared from the root and lower stem wood of Berberies aristata, Berberies Lycium and probably Berberies asiatica or coriaria. The Berberis is locally called Kemlu.

“In boiling out the product large quantities of green fuel are burnt. The common species used are banj (Quercus incana), keint (Pyrus Pashia), kakoa (Flacourtia Ramontchi), kembla (Mallotus philippinensis) and other broad leaves. Dry fuel is objected to as being more difficult to control in the kind of furnace used.

The roots of the berberies are dug up and after cutting off, say, the upper ¾ of the stem branches are well washed to remove all earth and foreign matter. They are then cut up into small pieces, the smaller the better. In the Basantgarh Range the sizes of the chips are about 1⅓" or 2" x ¼" or ½", but in the Basohli Tahsil (which prides itself on producing a better quality Rasaunt) the pieces are much smaller.

The chips are then put into earthen pots, in the proportion of 3 seers of chips to 5 seers of water, the pots being roughly 1' high 1" diameter.

These pots are then placed in two parallel rows on the top of a long furnace, the pots being sealed with clay into the small holes left on the top of the furnace for their reception, thus closing all cracks to the draught and distributing the heat from the fire evenly throughout the flume of the furnace.

The boiling goes on for about six hours. As water evaporates fresh water is poured in so as to keep the chips always well covered. At the end of this period the contents of pot 2 are poured into the practically empty pot 1, the contents of pot 3 into pot 2 and so on. This is not done quickly but leisurely and water added to rinse the chips. Where the iron pan is used, the extract is poured into that instead of into pot 1.

In this way the liquid contents of all the pots eventually finds its way to pot 1 on each row, or into the iron pan where it is still further evaporated until sufficiently concentrated. It is not known how long this takes, but apparently there is no hurry about it, and it may stand for some days or for a few hours. When ready it is of the consistency of a thick treacle, and is poured out into small receptacles made of the leaves of belangor (Bauhinia Vahlii) where it cools and thickens; eventually being packed into baskets for transport to Amritsar.

The larger part of the ‘rasaunt’ extract appears to be exported from Amritsar to Multan, whence it probably extends to Sindh and other desert tracts. Its use is largely in mixing with drinking water, What its effect on the water is, is not known to the writer at present, but its presence probably neutralises a salt, as it is said to make the water “cooler”.

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