COMFREY
Symphytum officinale
COMMON NAMES: Gum plant, healing herb, knit bone, nipbone.
FEATURES: The genus includes some twenty-five species of herbs native to Europe, Asia Minor, Siberia,
and Iran. The common comfey is naturalized in much of North America. Comfrey is a perennial with a
stout spreading root, brownish black and wrinkled; the stem about 3 feet high; and large, coarsely hairy,
egg- or lance-shaped leaves with wavy edges.
The purplish-blue, yellow, white, or red tubular flowers, less than 1 inch long, are borne in coiled
clusters. They have five stamens; the fruit consists of four shiny brown to black nutlets that can be seen in
August. It flowers in May and June and grows by riversides and in most moist places. The root contains a
large amount of mucilage and is rich in easily assimilated organic calcium.
MEDICINAL PARTS: Root, leaves.
SOLVENT: Water.
BODILY INFLUENCE: Demulcent, astringent.
USE: Native Americans discovered the medical value of comfrey and used it with many other naturalized
plants. When internal functions are weakened or injured to the degree of showing bloody discharge,
whether in sputum, urine, or bowels, comfey will prevent serious complications by healing the tissue and
easing the pain of the involved areas of bones, tendons, ruptured lungs, and other delicate cells.
Comfrey has long been accepted as being of great value as a soothing demulcent, a general stimulant to
the mucous membrane of the respiratory organs, and to help increase expectoration, thus aiding the
bronchial tubes.
A syrup made of equal parts of comfey and elecampane roots is a most valuable agent for coughs,
consumption, and all affections of the lungs. In Nature’s Healing Agents S. Clymer (1963) tells us of:
“numerous uncontradicted reports of lung cancer cured where all other means have failed and in which
the sole treatment consisted of infusion made from the whole green plant and, even in some instances, of
infusion made from the powder of entire plant.”
For the purpose of cleansing the entire system of impurities and establishing a normal condition,