Medicinal Action & Uses of Long Pepper (Piper longum)

[Guest guest]

Medicinal Action & Uses of Long Pepper

(United States Pharmacopceia).

---

http://www.botanical.com/botanical/mgmh/p/pepper24.html

 

The best Pepper of commerce comes from Malabar. Pepper is mentioned

by Roman writers in the fifth century. It is said that Attila

demanded among other items 3,000 lb. of Pepper in ransom for the

city of Rome.

In England, for grinding they mix Peppers of different origin.

Malabar for weight, Sumatra for colour, and Penang for strength.

Pepper has an aromatic odour, pungent and bitterish taste.

 

Its medicinal activities depends mainly on its pungent resin and

volatile oil, which is colourless, turning yellow with age, with a

strong odour, and not so acrid a taste as the peppercorn; it also

contains starch, cellulose and colouring.

 

---Medicinal Action and Uses---Aromatic, stimulant, carminative; is

said to possess febrifuge properties. Its action as a stimulant is

specially evident on the mucous membrane of the rectum, and so is

good for constipation, also on the urinary organs;

externally it is a rubefacient, useful in relaxed conditions of the

rectum when prolapsed; sometimes used in place of cubebs for

gonorrhoea; given in combination with aperients to facilitate their

action, and to prevent griping.

As a gargle it is valued for relaxed uvula, paralysis of the tongue.

 

On account of its stimulant action it aids digestion and is

specially useful in atonic dyspepsia and torbid condition of the

stomach. It will correct flatulence and nausea.

It has also been used in vertigo, paralytic and arthritic disorders.

 

It is sometimes added to quinine when the stomach will not respond

to quinine alone. It has also been advised in diarrhoea, cholera,

scarlatina, and in solution for a wash for tinea capititis. Piperine

should not be combined with astringents, as it renders them inert.

 

---Dosages---Black Pepper, 5 to 15 grains in powder. Piperine, 1 to

8 grains.

The root of the Pepper plant in India has been used by the natives

as a cordial tonic and stimulant.

B.P. dose of Pepper, 1 to 2 drachms.

Oleoresin, U.S.P.: dose, 1/2 grain.

 

Heliotropin is recommended medicinally as an antiseptic and

antipyretic. It is obtained by the oxidation of piperic acid and is

used in perfumery.

 

From the time of Hippocrates Pepper has been used as a medicine and

condiment.

---Adulteration of Pepper---Linseed mustard seed, wheat and pea-

flour, sago, ground rice. At one time when the duty levied on Pepper

was very high, fictitious peppercorns were made of oil-cake, clay,

with a little cayenne added.

--

---Other Species Used---

Piper trioicum

White Pepper

Long Pepper

 

WHITE PEPPER

(Piper album)

 

From the same plant as P. nigrum, White Pepper is ripe fruit,

partially deprived of its pericarp by maceration in water, then

rubbed and dried in the sun. It contains albuminous seed, having

small starch grains, taste and smell like Pepper, more aromatic than

black and not so pungent. Same as the black, but containing more

starch and less ash. Sold as whole White Pepper or broken White

Pepper. The removed hulls are sold separately as Pepper hulls, and

form a brownish powder, very pungent in smell and flavour and

containing a large quantity of oleoresin of Pepper, but no piperine.

 

Sometimes the hulls are mixed with the broken White Pepper; this

mixture has more oleoresin in it and less piperine.

 

---Medicinal Action and Uses---Teaspoonful doses taken several times

a day are recommended to overcome the obstinate constipation of

dyspeptics.

---

LONG PEPPER

(Piper longum)

---Part Used---The dried, unripe spikes of Pipers officinum and

longum.

---Habitat---Java, India, Philippines, the best coming from Batavia,

and Singapore.

P. officinarum is principally used and is considered the best; both

are gathered when green, when they are hotter than when quite ripe.

In P. officinarum the fruit is a dark grey colour with a weak

aromatic odour and a very fiery pungent taste. In P. longum the

fruits are shorter and thicker and the constituents almost identical

with P. nigrum. It contains piperine, a soft green resin, a burning

acridity, a volatile oil which possibly gives it its odour; it is

inferior to P. nigrum and most used as its adulterant.