Scrophularia nodosa

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Scrophularia nodosa
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Plantae Division: Magnoliophyta Class: Magnoliopsida Order: Lamiales Family: Scrophulariaceae Genus: Scrophularia Species: S. nodosa
Binomial name
Scrophularia nodosa L.

Scrophularia nodosa (also called figwort, woodland figwort, and common figwort) is a perennial herbaceous plant from temperate regions of the Northern hemisphere except western North America ^[1] . It grows in moist and cultivated waste ground.^[2]

It grows upright, with thick, sharply square, succulent stems up to 150cm tall from a horizontal rootstock. Its leaves are opposite, ovate at the base and lanceolate at the tip, all having toothed margins. The flowers are in loose cymes in oblong or pyramidal panicles. The individual flowers are globular, with five green sepals encircling green or purple petals, giving way to an egg-shaped seed capsule.^[3]

First year Scrophularia nodosa plant: swollen hypocotyl/stem with scars from the first four pairs of leaves (1-4). From (Warming 1884)

[edit] Folklore

The plant was thought, by the doctrine of signatures to be able to cure the throat disease scrofula because of the throat-like shape of its flowers.^[4]

[edit] References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

Scrophularia nodosa