Capsella bursa-pastoris

Wow. Looks like the rest of the herbalists were busy publishing to newspapers around the globe while I was trying to get moved and unpacked. I found this jewel posted on The Daily Yomiuri Online, a Japanese newspaper. It's written by Kevin Short (an odd-sounding name for someone who's title is Nature Columnist for a Japanese newspaper.) Capsella bursa-pastoris , also known as Shepard's Purse, grows everywhere... even in Japan it seems.

"In addition to edible leaves, the shepherd's purse has for centuries served people as a valuable medicinal herb. In Europe it has long been used to stanch bleeding, both internal and external. In World War I, when supplies of other medicines ran low, readily available shepherd's purse saw abundant battlefield duty. Today, herbal practitioners prescribe it as a gentle remedy for heavy menstrual bleeding. In Chinese and Japanese herbal medicine, poultices soaked in decocted shepherd's purse are applied to bloodshot and itchy eyes."

I tried to research other articles by Kevin on The Daily Yomiuri, but it doesn't look like the links stay active for long. So to save it for posterity, click the "MORE" link below...

(This article copied in it's entirety from The Daily Yomiuri. Copyright 2002 The Yomiuri Shimbun)

Shepherd's purse: a medicinal weed

Kevin Short / Special to The Daily Yomiuri

Catal Huyuk, in what is now south-central Turkey, was one of the world's first settled farming communities. The Neolithic people who built the substantial town nearly 9,000 years ago grew wheat, barley and peas, and probably herded goats and sheep. They lived in houses of mud brick, worshiped leopard goddesses, and traded with other communities throughout the Mesopotamian region.

Among the abundant remains found at Catal Huyuk were tiny seeds of a plant that botanists would later name Capsella bursa-pastoris. The plant itself probably thrived as a weed on the outskirts of the village. The people may have eaten its young leaves; they may even have been aware of the plant's medicinal value.

As time passed, agriculture spread throughout the Mediterranean region and all over Europe and Africa. To the east, separate farming cultures developed in the Indus Valley, and along the Yellow River in China. From these centers, domesticated crops spread throughout the Eurasian continent.

Wherever people tilled the land and built villages and cities, Capsella bursa-pastoris followed. Today, this plant, commonly known in English as shepherd's purse, continues to thrive as a weed almost wherever people live. On my countryside walks, I find them on the dikes among the rice paddies, and in Tokyo I also spot them growing in parks and gardens, and sometimes even in small patches of inner city street greenery.

Capsella bursa-pastoris is a biennial plant. The seeds germinate in summer, growing into a flat cushion of basal leaves known as a rosette. The plant passes the winter months in the rosette stage, then sends up a flower stalk in early spring. The tiny white flowers are typical of the mustard family, with four petals arranged in a Maltese cross pattern. The fruits, responsible for the English and scientific names, are triangular capsules, which look like a type of shoulder bag carried by shepherds.

The sawtooth basal leaves are edible, and in Japan are one of the ingredients in haru no nanakusa gayu, or "rice gruel cooked with seven herbs of spring," which is traditionally eaten on Jan. 7. Legend holds that by eating this rice porridge one can enjoy long life and avoid misfortune.

The other six herbs are suzushiro (daikon radish greens), suzuna (kabu turnip greens), seri (water-dropwort or Oenanthe javanica), gogyo (cudweed or Gnaphalium affine), hakobera (chickweed or Stellaria neglecta) and hotokenoza (nipplewort or Lapsana apogonoides).

Today, Japanese people enjoy the dish as part of their appreciation of the changing seasons. In the past, however, this gruel played an important role in maintaining health during the harsh winter months. Under the old lunar calendar, the day for eating the rice porridge would have fallen much later, just about at the time when pickled vegetables stockpiled in autumn were running out, but before the first spring crops were available.

In addition to edible leaves, the shepherd's purse has for centuries served people as a valuable medicinal herb. In Europe it has long been used to stanch bleeding, both internal and external. In World War I, when supplies of other medicines ran low, readily available shepherd's purse saw abundant battlefield duty. Today, herbal practitioners prescribe it as a gentle remedy for heavy menstrual bleeding. In Chinese and Japanese herbal medicine, poultices soaked in decocted shepherd's purse are applied to bloodshot and itchy eyes.

The shepherd's purse is one of the most widely known wildflowers here in Japan. The official Japanese designation is nazuna, but a more common name is pen-pen gusa. Kusa or gusa is a generic term for herbaceous plants, and pen-pen represents the twangy sound made by plucking a shamisen. To the Japanese, the same seed capsules that remind Westerners of a shepherd's shoulder bag look like the pick used to play the shamisen. Children like to twirl the stalks rapidly between their fingers, enjoying the rattling sound made by the seed capsules knocking against each other.

In cool regions, the plants stay in their rosettes throughout the winter months. This low growth form protects them from the elements. They can survive a snow covering, and think nothing of getting stepped or walked on. In warmer areas, such as Tokyo, the plants may even send up a short flower stalk during a warm spell in winter.

Shepherd's purse spread across the Eurasian continent before the dawn of written history, and probably reached Japan thousands of years ago. Much later, Europeans carried it across the Atlantic Ocean, and it is now a common weed in the Americas as well.

Copyright 2002 The Yomiuri Shimbun

Posted by Evo Terra at December 05, 2002 06:56 PM | TrackBack (0)