Common Name: BurdockBotanical Name: Arctium lappa (LINN.)
Family: N. O. Compositae
Genus: Arctium, derived from
Greek arktos
Other common names: Lappa, Fox's Clote, Thorny Burr, Beggar's Buttons, Cockle Buttons, Love Leaves, Philanthropium, Personata, Happy Major, Clot_Bur.
Parts Used: Root, herb and seeds (fruits).
Habitat: It grows freely throughout England (though rarely in Scotland) and throughout North America’s temperate zone on waste ground and about old buildings, by roadsides and in fairly damp places.
The Burdock, only British member of its genus, belongs to Thistle group of great order, Compositae.
Description: A stout handsome plant, with large, wavy leaves and round heads of purple flowers. It is enclosed in a globular involucre of long stiff scales with hooked tips, scales being also often interwoven with a white, cottony substance.
The whole plant is a dull, pale green, stem about 3 to 4 feet and branched, rising from a biennial root. The lower leaves are very large, on long, solid footstalks, furrowed above, frequently more than a foot long heart shaped and of a grey colour on their under surfaces from mass of fine down with which they are covered. The upper leaves are much smaller, more egg shaped in form and not so densely clothed beneath with grey down.
The plant varies considerably in appearance, and by some botanists various subspecies, or even separate species, have been described, variations being according to size of flower heads and of whole plant, abundance of whitish cotton-like substance that is sometimes found on involucres, or absence of it, length of flower stalks, etc.
The flower heads are found expanded during latter part of summer and well into autumn: all florets are tubular, stamens dark purple and styles whitish. The plant owes its dissemination greatly to little hooked prickles of its involucre, which adhere to everything with which they come in contact, and by attaching themselves to coats of animals are often carried to a great distance.
“They are Burs, I can tell you, they'll stick where they are thrown,” Shakespeare makes Pandarus say in Troilus and Cressida, and in King Lear we have another direct reference to this plant: “Crown'd with rank Fumiter and Furrow-weeds, With Burdocks, Hemlocks, Nettles, Cuckoo-flowers.” Also in As You Like It: “ROSALIND. How full of briers is this working-day world! CELIA. They are but burs, cousin, thrown upon thee in holiday foolery. If we walk not in trodden paths, our very petticoats will catch them.”
The name of genus, Arctium, is derived from Greek arktos, a bear, in allusion to roughness of burs, lappa, specific name, being derived from a word meaning 'to seize.'
Another source derives word lappa from Celtic llap, a hand, on account of its prehensile properties.
The plant gets its name of 'Dock' from its large leaves; 'Bur' is supposed to be a contraction of French bourre, from Latin burra, a lock of wool, such is often found entangled with it when sheep have passed by growing plants.
An old English name for Burdock was 'Herrif,' 'Aireve,' or 'Airup,' from Anglo Saxon hoeg, a hedge, and reafe, a robber - or from Anglo Saxon verb reafian, to seize. Culpepper gives as popular names in his time: Personata, Happy Major and Clot-Bur.
Though growing in its wild state hardly any animal except ass will browse on this plant, stalks, cut before flower is open and stripped of their rind, form a delicate vegetable when boiled, similar in flavour to Asparagus, and also make a pleasant salad, eaten raw with oil and vinegar. Formerly they were sometimes candied with sugar, as Angelica is now. They are slightly laxative, but perfectly wholesome.
Cultivation: As Burdock grows freely in waste places and hedgerows, it can be collected in wild state, and is seldom worth cultivating.
It will grow in almost any soil, but roots are formed best in a light well drained soil. The seeds germinate readily and may be sown directly in field, either in autumn or early spring, in drills 18 inches to 3 feet apart, sowing 1 inch deep in autumn, but less in spring. The young plants when well up are thinned out to 6 inches apart in row.
Yields at rate of 1,500 to 2,000 lb. of dry roots per acre have been obtained from plantations of Burdock.
Parts Used Medicinally: The dried root from plants of first year's growth forms official drug, but leaves and fruits (commonly, though erroneously, called seeds) are also used.
The roots are dug in July, and should be lifted with a beet-lifter or a deep-running plough. As a rule they are 12 inches or more in length and about 1 inch thick, sometimes, however, they extend 2 to 3 feet, making it necessary to dig by hand. They are fleshy, wrinkled, crowned with a tuft of whitish, soft, hairy leaf stalks, grey-brown externally, whitish internally, with a somewhat thick bark, about a quarter of diameter of root, and soft wood tissues, with a radiate structure.
Burdock root has a sweetish and mucilaginous taste.
Burdock leaves, which are less used than root, are collected in July. For drying, follow drying of Coltsfoot leaves. They have a somewhat bitter taste.
The seeds (or fruits) are collected when ripe. They are brownish-grey, wrinkled, about 1/4 inch long and 1/16 inch in diameter. They are shaken out of head and dried by spreading them out on paper in sun.
Constituents: Inulin, mucilage, sugar, a bitter, crystalline glucoside-Lappin, a little resin, fixed and volatile oils, and some tannic acid.
The roots contain starch, and ashes of plant, burnt when green, yield carbonate of potash abundantly, and also some nitre.
Medicinal Action and Uses: Alterative, diuretic and diaphoretic. One of best blood purifiers. In all skin diseases, it is a certain remedy and has effected a cure in many cases of eczema, either taken alone or combined with other remedies, such as Yellow Dock and Sarsaparilla.
