favour only for colic, constipation and stitches; scurvy finds no mention.^159
Almost a century later, John Lightfoot in his turn was able to report it as
esteemed in the Highlands only as a stomachic.^160 Other Highland records
have been similarly unconnected with scurvy: as a poultice for cramps and
boils^161 and for taking away water from the eyes.^162
In Ireland, unlike Britain, scurvy-grass has also been found effective for
cuts. On one of the islets off the coast of Donegal an ointment was made
from it for that purpose.^163
Capsella bursa-pastoris (Linnaeus) Medikus
shepherd’s-purse
cosmopolitan weed
The astringency possessed by the very common weed Capsella bursa-pastoris
(probably a native of Asia) has led it to be valued for stopping bleeding and
for excessive menstrual discharge, uses which feature in the folk records from
the Highlands164, 165and Essex,^166 respectively. A related function in the Isle
of Man is as a cure for diarrhoea.^167
For Ireland, however, as so often, applications seem to have been quite
different: in Limerick it has been drunk as a tea or chewed for kidney trou-
ble,^168 and there is a record of its use for rickets that has yet to be pinpointed
geographically.^169
Lepidium latifolium Linnaeus
dittander
Europe, south-western Asia, North Africa; introduced into
North America
‘The women of Bury [St Edmunds] in Suffolk doe usually give the juice
thereof in ale to drinke to women with child to procure them a speedy deliv-
ery in travail’. This seventeenth-century report^170 by John Parkinson is the
only known claim Lepidium latifolium has to be considered a possible folk
herb. His contemporary, John Ray, despite his East Anglian background,
could do no more than repeat the report without comment.^171
Sinapis arvensis Linnaeus
charlock
Europe, western Asia, North Africa; introduced into other continents
Sinapis arvensis and its fellow weed of cultivated ground, wild radish (Ra-
phanus raphanistrum), were drawn on in the Shetlands to keep scurvy at bay.^172
In Ireland, if it is rightly identified as the ‘corn kale’ (which might equally
120 Cochlearia