Herba Cana - Northeastern Illinois University

© 2004 by CRC Press
554 Florida Ethnobotany
Pycnanthemum albescens. From Britton and Brown 1898.
Pycnanthemum albescens (whitish)
sak:fotó [iska fotó] (Koasati; probably cognate
with Creek kvfockv [kafócka]; cf. Piloblephis)
shinuktiɬ eli [shinuktelele] (shinuk, sand [probably
originally shilup, ghost], tiɬ eli, to drive out,
Choctaw; this name is a variant of the one
used for Monarda punctata, which see)
white [white-leaf] mountain-mint [whiteleaf mountainmint]
Pycnanthemum flexuosum (curved alternately in
opposite directions)
Appalachian mountain-mint [mountainmint]
dysentery weed
My education about Pycnanthemum began when I
was working with my undergraduate professor Gordon
Hunter. He had become interested in the mints
and hired me in the 1960s to collect and work with him
on some of the problems in the western Kentucky
species. I knew the plants in the Jackson Purchase
region of Kentucky between the Tennessee and Mississippi
Rivers, but he had me look more closely at
them. During the time that I was gathering specimens
for him, I did not know that they had a long and
complicated history of association with people.
An early mention of what is now P. virginianum,
published in 1697 by Paulo Boccone (1633 /1703/04),
an Italian monk, physician, and professor at Padua,
alludes to its medical application. He called the plants
Serpentaria virginianus (Virginia snakeroot), and
plants with that name were considered remedies for
snakebite. That common name has been applied to
numerous plants in different genera over the past few
centuries (cf. also Aristolochia).
In 1696, Leonard Plukenet discussed the same
species, but he gave it the phrase name Clinopodium,
pulegii angusto rididoque foliio, virginianum (Clinopodium,
with narrow and rigid leaves like pulegium
[pennyroyal], from Virginia). Both Jan Gronovius’s
Flora Virginica and Linnaeus’s Hortus Cliffortianus
followed Plukenet’s lead in thinking the herbs were a
Clinopodium, but another early student of the herbs
thought differently. In his 1699 book, Robert Morrison
emphasized that the Virginia plants should be a
distinct species of Pulegium. After further study,
Linnaeus changed his mind, and in 1753 he called
the plants Satureja virginiana. Thus, in the first 57
years that single species had been known, it had been
placed in four genera. People are still debating
placement of many species in the Lamiaceae, as genera
of mints remain problematical. However, most now
agree that the species discussed from Plukenet to
Linnaeus is Pycnanthemum, a genus created by Michaux
in 1803. We now know of 17 species endemic to
North America (Mabberley 1997).
Indigenous people in the eastern United States
have long been familiar with Pycnanthemum. People
from the Ojibwa of southern Canada to the Cherokee
of the Carolinas are recorded as using the plants in
seasoning food (Densmore 1928, Hamel and Chiltoskey
1975). As Fernald et al. (1958) noted, most of the
aromatic mints have been used as food additives to
improve flavors. The common name ‘‘basil’’ or ‘‘American
wild basil’’ widely applied to Pycnanthemum
alludes to a more widespread application in seasoning
food than most literature suggests. It is known that P.
muticum contains several volatile oils including pulegone,
menthol, menthone, and limonene; presumably
all species contain different mixtures of those aromatic
compounds (Hocking 1997). Porcher (1862) was
especially complimentary to the family when he wrote
that it does ‘‘not contain a single unwholesome or even
suspicious species; their tonic, cordial, and stomachic
qualities are due ... to the presence of an aromatic,
volatile oil, and a bitter principle.’’
Medicine and food blend in most cultures so that
it is not always possible to distinguish one from the
other. However, several tribes considered different
species of Pycnanthemum a good remedy for colds
(Moerman 1998). Foster and Duke (1990) say that all
species were used interchangeably.
In the southeastern United States, the Choctaw
used a leaf decoction to promote sweating in treatment
of colds (Bushnell 1909, Taylor 1940). The Koasati put
the whole P. albescens plant in water, then used it to
stop nosebleed. Roots mixed with those of Salix nigra
were boiled, and the decoction drunk to relieve
headache (Taylor 1940). To relieve contagion of death
(onalfapó) leaves were put in cold water and the
resulting mixture drunk and used to bathe the body
while facing east (Kimball 1994). The Choctaw, the