The efficacy and function of charcoal grass

In daily life, people are not only very familiar with various foods, but also come into contact with a lot of medicines in daily life. Among them, charcoal motherwort is a relatively common Chinese medicinal material. Given that there are still many people who don’t know much about charcoal motherwort, let’s take a detailed look at it below.

[Other names] Fire charcoal hair (Essentials of Raw Herbal Medicine Properties), black charcoal seeds (A Long Compilation of Illustrations of Plant Names and Realities), transport medicine (Classification of Herbal Properties), mountain buckwheat grass (Fujian Folk Herbal Medicine), eel vine, dizziness medicine (Sichuan Chinese Materia Medica), black white rice grass (Quanzhou Materia Medica), fire charcoal star, magpie sugar plum (Lingnan Herbal Medicine), red dili, black rice vine, water sand orange, cormorant rice, water retreat sha (Fujian Chinese Herbal Medicine), red plum cotyledon, white rice grass, large-leaf beach grass (Guangdong Chinese Herbal Medicine), mouse sugarcane (Guangxi Chinese Herbal Medicine).

[Source] The whole herb of the Polygonum multiflorum plant of the Polygonaceae family. Harvest in summer and autumn and sun-dried.

[Original morphology] Perennial erect or semi-climbing herb, about 1.5 meters long. The stem is slightly grooved, smooth or covered with sparse or glandular hairs, lying obliquely on the ground or attached to the ground. The lower part is solid and branched. The creeping ones take roots at the nodes. The young branches are purple-red. Leaves are alternate, petiolate and winged; leaf blades are ovate-oblong or ovate-triangular, 7-12 cm long, entire or with fine rounded teeth, base is cut, rounded or nearly cordate, sometimes with 2 auricular lobes; leaves on upper branches are cordate, with short petioles or sessile and clasping the stem; bright green or with V-shaped black lines on the upper side, with hairy main veins on the lower side; the sheath is membranous and obliquely truncated. Inflorescence capitulate, then organized into panicles or corymbs, inflorescence axis often covered with pus-hair, without involucre; bracteoles smooth, usually acute; florets white, pinkish or purple; perianth 5-lobed; stamens 8; ovary superior, style 3-lobed. Achenes are ovate, black, triangular, and enclosed in persistent perianth. Flowering period is September (Sichuan).

[Habitat distribution] It grows on sunny grass slopes, forest edges, and moist soil along roadsides in hilly areas. Distributed in Taiwan, Fujian, Jiangxi, Guangdong, Guangxi, Yunnan, Sichuan and Guizhou. Produced in Guangdong, Guangxi, Sichuan, Guizhou, Fujian and other places.

[Properties] The dry stem is very long, brown to brown-purple, with longitudinal wrinkles, long internodes, and swollen nodes; it is brittle and easy to break, and the pith is loose. The leaves are wrinkled, withered yellow or yellow-green, with faintly visible purple-black spots on both sides of the main veins; the stipules are sheath-shaped, light yellow-brown, often broken and incomplete. It has a faint smell and a light, slightly bitter taste. It is best to use dry and impurity-free ones.

【Nature and flavor】Sour, sweet, cool.

【Functions and indications】 Clears away heat and dampness, cools blood and detoxifies. It is used to treat diarrhea, dysentery, jaundice, sore throat due to wind-heat, weakness and dizziness, summer malarial disease in children, convulsions, leucorrhea in women, carbuncles, eczema, and injuries from falls.

[Usage and Dosage] For oral use: decocted in water, 0.5-1 liang (1-2 liang for fresh product); or mashed into juice. For external use; mash and apply or decoct in water for washing.

[Additional prescription] ① For the treatment of red and white dysentery: mash the charcoal motherwort and sea sand to extract the juice, add boiling water, add a little sugar and drink it. (Records of Collecting Medicinal Herbs in Lingnan)

【Clinical application】 ①Treatment of diphtheria

【Excerpt】 《*Dictionary》

[Source] From "Compendium of Materia Medica".

From the above we can see that the Chinese medicine Charcoal Grass has very high medicinal value, so we can consider using Charcoal Grass in our lives.