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The seventeenth century
Published in Michael J. O’Dowd, The History of Medications for Women, 2020
The vervain plant, Verbena officinalis, takes its name from the Latin verbena, and the Old French verveine. The plant was long believed to have great aphrodisiac, magical and medicinal powers and was hung around the necks of children as an amulet to ward off infections (Vickery, 1995). The ancient Egyptians knew vervain by it’s symbolic name ‘tears of Isis’. In the first century AD Cornelius Celsus described vervain in his De mediana relating how the leaves and twigs of the plant were commonly used in ceremonial processions (Spencer, 1871). Verbena was the classical name for altar plants. Dioscorides described two species of vervain, Verbena supina and Verbena recta (the latter was also known as Sacra herba or Herba sanguinalis). He reported that ye leaves applied as a Pessum with Rosaceum or New Swine’s Grease, do cause a sensation of ye womb pains’ (Gunther, 1959). During Saxon times in England (fifth and sixth centuries AD) it was thought that if a person wore a sprig of vervain they would not be barked at by dogs.
Herbs with Antidepressant Effects
Published in Scott Mendelson, Herbal Treatment of Major Depression, 2019
Verbena officinalis has long been used for arthritic conditions due to anti-inflammatory effects. Modern studies have borne out the rationale for this use. In a standard test of anti-inflammatory effect, oral administration of extract of triterpene greatly reduced 12-O-tetradecanoylphorbol-13-acetate-induced ear edema in rats.7 Oral administration of extract also ameliorated carrageenan-induced paw edema in rats, in a manner similar to that of the anti-inflammatory agent indomethacin and helped prevent the gastric ulceration induced by exposure to alcohol, almost to the extent of protection given by misoprostol.8
Differential effect of herbal tea extracts on free fatty acids-, ethanol- and acetaminophen-induced hepatotoxicity in FL83B hepatocytes
Published in Drug and Chemical Toxicology, 2022
Guan-Wen Chen, Tai-Yuan Chen, Pei-Ming Yang
Acetaminophen overdose is the major cause of drug-induced acute liver failure (Yan et al.2018). We found that treatment with acetaminophen at the concentrations more than 2.5 mM induced significant hepatotoxicity in FL83B cells (Figure 4(A)). To investigate the effect of herbal extracts on acetaminophen-induced hepatotoxicity, FL83B cells were treated with 10 mM acetaminophen for 24 h with or without herbal extracts, and then cell viability was analyzed by an MTT assay. We found that herbal extracts from Verbena officinalis L. (Ex-1), Hyssopus officinalis L. (Ex-2), Salvia officinalis L. (Ex-3), Urtica dioica L. (Ex-4), Hemerocallis fulva (L.) L. (Ex-5), and Ficus formosana Maxim. (Ex-8) could protect FL83B cells from acetaminophen-induced cytotoxicity (Figure 4(B)).