Wormwood: Artemisia Absinthium
Leaves are used to ward off insects and as a medicinal tonic.
Attractive shrubby plants with fine grey-green foliage and numerous yellow flowers in spires,
48-70" tall. Perennial in zones 3-8.
🌿 WORMWOOD ✴️ artemisia absinthium 🌿 BE CAREFUL❗️❕
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Artemisia absinthium aka wormwood flowers an update
Artemisia absinthium (absinthe, absinthium, absinthe wormwood, wormwood) is a species of Artemisia, native to temperate regions of Eurasia and Northern Africa and widely naturalized in Canada and the northern United States. It is grown as an ornamental plant and is used as an ingredient in the spirit absinthe as well as some other alcoholic drinks.
Description:
Artemisia absinthium is a herbaceous, perennial plant with fibrous roots. The stems are straight, growing to 0.8–1.2 metres (2 ft 7 in–3 ft 11 in) (rarely 1.5 m, but, sometimes even larger) tall, grooved, branched, and silvery-green. The leaves are spirally arranged, greenish-grey above and white below, covered with silky silvery-white trichomes, and bearing minute oil-producing glands; the basal leaves are up to 25 cm long, bipinnate to tripinnate with long petioles, with the cauline leaves (those on the stem) smaller, 5–10 cm long, less divided, and with short petioles; the uppermost leaves can be both simple and sessile (without a petiole). Its flowers are pale yellow, tubular, and clustered in spherical bent-down heads (capitula), which are in turn clustered in leafy and branched panicles. Flowering is from early summer to early autumn; pollination is anemophilous. The fruit is a small achene; seed dispersal is by gravity.
It grows naturally on uncultivated, arid ground, on rocky slopes, and at the edge of footpaths and fields.
Toxicity
NOTE: Artemisia absinthium contains thujone, a GABAA receptor antagonist that can cause epileptic-like convulsions and kidney failure when ingested in large amounts.
Cultivation:
Artemisia absinthium. Inflorescences
The plant can easily be cultivated in dry soil. It should be planted under bright exposure in fertile, mid-weight soil. It prefers soil rich in nitrogen. It can be propagated by ripened cuttings taken in Spring or Autumn in temperate climates, or by seeds in nursery beds. Artemisia absinthium also self-seeds generously. It is naturalised in some areas away from its native range, including much of North America and Kashmir Valley of India.
This plant, and its cultivars 'Lambrook Mist' and 'Lambrook Silver' have gained the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit.
Uses:
It is an ingredient in the spirit absinthe, and is used for flavouring in some other spirits and wines, including bitters, vermouth and pelinkovac. In the Middle Ages, it was used to spice mead, and in Morocco it is used as tea. In 18th century England, wormwood was sometimes used instead of hops in beer.
Etymology:
Artemisia comes from Ancient Greek ἀρτεμισία, from Ἄρτεμις (Artemis). In Hellenistic culture, Artemis was a goddess of the hunt, and protector of the forest and children. absinthum comes from the Ancient Greek ἀψίνθιον.
The word "wormwood" comes from Middle English wormwode or wermode. The form "wormwood" is attributable to its traditional use as a vermifuge. Webster's Third New International Dictionary attributes the etymology to Old English wermōd (compare with German Wermut and the derived drink vermouth), which the OED (s.v.) marks as "of obscure origin".
Cultural history:
Nicholas Culpeper insisted that wormwood was the key to understanding his 1651 book The English Physitian. Richard Mabey describes Culpeper's entry on this bitter-tasting plant as "stream-of-consciousness" and "unlike anything else in the herbal", and states that it reads "like the ramblings of a drunk". Culpeper biographer Benjamin Woolley suggests the piece may be an allegory about bitterness, as Culpeper had spent his life fighting the Establishment, and had been imprisoned and seriously wounded in battle as a result.
William Shakespeare referred to Wormwood in his famous play Romeo and Juliet: Act 1, Scene 3. Juliet's childhood nurse said, "For I had then laid wormwood to my dug" meaning that the nurse had weaned Juliet, then aged three, by using the bitter taste of Wormwood on her nipple.
John Locke, in his 1689 book titled An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, used wormwood as an example of bitterness, writing that "For a child knows as certainly before it can speak the difference between the ideas of sweet and bitter (i.e. that sweet is not bitter), as it knows afterwards (when it comes to speak) that wormwood and sugarplums are not the same thing."
Artemisia absinthium is traditionally used medicinally in Europe, and is believed to stimulate the appetite and relieve indigestion.
Green Thumb Tip:
Sow seeds indoors on surface of soil. Transplant outdoors after danger of frost has passed in
late spring. Can also be directly sown outdoors two weeks after the last spring frost. Prefers rich,
moist, well-drained soil.
START INDOORS
6-8 weeks before last frost
GERMINATION
7-10 Days
PLANT OUTDOORS
24-36" Apart
LIGHT
Full Sun
Description of Plant(s) and Culture:
Wormwood's woody rootstock produces many bushy stems, which grow from 2-4 feet high and bear alternate, bi- or tri-pinnate leaves with long, obtuse lobes. Numerous tiny, yellow-green, rayless flower heads grow in leafy panicles from July to October.
The stem of wormwood is branched, and firm, almost woody at the base. The stem is covered with fine silky hairs, as are the leaves. The leaves themselves are 3 inches long by one broad, thrice pinnate with linear, blunt segments. They are grayish-green and have a distinct odor.
Wormwood is not heat tolerant. Zones 4-10.
There are other varieties of wormwood. Annual wormwood (Artemisia annua L.) otherwise known as Sweet Annie, is a bushy plant 1-9 feet tall; used in the treatment of malaria. Related to A. absinthium, it is not poisonous but may cause dermatitis. A. heterophylla; Paiute name is "Kose-wiup," At Owyhee, Nevada, a basket was used to steep these wormwood leaves, and put them next to a baby's skin to reduce fever. The Shoshone name for this herb is "Pava hobe," California Native Americans called it "Poonkinny." Packets of steamed plants were placed on limbs for rheumatism, and a sweat bath given. Another wormwood, (A. gnaphalodes), Paiute and Shoshone gave the same names as to A. heterophylla. They made a tea called "Ba wa zip," (young people's tea). Smoky Valley Tea and steam bath was for young girls approaching maturity.
North Dakota Department of Agriculture prohibits sale of Wormwood into North Dakota
(Wormwood = Artemisia absinthium)
Where Found:
Found in waste places and along roadsides from Newfoundland to Hudson Bay and south to Montana. Wormwood is a native plant in Europe, from where it was introduced into North America.
Biochemical Information:
Absinthol which is common to all worm-woods, in addition to other essential oils including pinene, cineol borneol phenol cuminic aldehyde, artemisia ketone.
Legends, Myths and Stories:
Wormwood's name is obviously derived from its medicinal property of expelling intestinal worms for which it has been well known since ancient times. An Egyptian papyrus dated 1,600 years before Christ describes this bitter herb.
Legend has it that this plant first sprang up on the impressions marking the serpent's tail as he slithered his way out of Eden. According to folk beliefs, wormwood was reputed to deprive a man of his courage, but a salve made from it was supposed to be effective in driving away goblins who came at night.
Wormwood is a principal ingredient in the dangerous alcoholic drink absinthe, which has been made illegal all over the world because it deteriorates the nervous system, causing attacks similar to epileptic seizures. Absinthe is a bitter, aromatic, alcoholic drink that was very popular in Italy, France, and Switzerland during the 19th century. Because of the addictive nature of wormwood and the frequent side effects when absinthe was used to excess (dizziness, seizures, stupor, delirium, hallucinations, and even death) it has now been banned in nearly every country of the world. Wormwood planted as a border, it keeps animals from the garden.
