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Gerard's Herbal Vol. 1

Gerard's Herbal V1 - CHAP. 28. Of Zedoary.

CHAP. 28. Of Zedoary.


Fig. 70. Round Zedoary

            Zedoary is also a root growing naturally in the woods of Malabar about Calicut and Cannanore in the Indies; the leaves thereof are larger than Ginger, and much like them; the root is also as large, but consisting of parts of different figures, some long and small, others round; their colour is white, and oft times brownish on the inside, and they have many fibres coming out of them, but they are taken away together with the outward rind before they come to us. These roots have a strong medicine-like smell, and somewhat an ungrateful taste.

The Names.

            Some call the long parts of these roots Zedoaria, and the round (whose figure we here give you) Zerumbeth, and make them different, whenas indeed they are but parts of the same root, as Lobel and others have well observed. Some make Zedoaria and Zerumbeth different, as Avicenna: others confound them and make them one, as Rhases and Serapio. It is an aromatic, and therefore chiefly mixed in ointments: which is as much as if he should have said, That it was put into ointments for the smell's sake, which in this is no ways grateful, but rather the contrary.

The Temperature and Virtues.

            A. It is hot and dry in the second degree; it discusses flatulencies, and fattens by a certain hidden quality. It also dissipates and amends the ungrateful smell which Garlic, Onions, or too much wine infect the breath withal, if it be eaten after them. It cures the bites and stings of venomous creatures, stops lasks, resolves the abscesses of the womb, stays vomiting, helps the colic, as also the pain of the stomach.

            B. It kills all sorts of worms, and is much used in antidotes against the plague, and such like contagious diseases.

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