Title : Mint
link : Mint
Mint
Mentha sp
By Neely Ashmun
Wildflower School 2012
UUUUUuuuuuuuughhhhh.
By Neely Ashmun
Wildflower School 2012
UUUUUuuuuuuuughhhhh.
That’s how I feel when I start to see lights in front of my eyes. And on comes the dreaded migraine.
I haven’t had one in almost a year but this time it’s a doozie. Accompanied by a nausea that can’t be calmed with food or drink, I wait in darkness for my friends to leave the house, on their way to VIP passes at Blues on the Green—which I’ll be missing thanks to this onslaught of pain. I love my friends but right now I’m waiting anxiously for them to be on their way, leaving me in soothing silence.
If I had diligently followed your instructions and taken my wild mint tea every week, perhaps I could have held this killer at bay, but as it is I’m scrambling for my peppermint oil ointment purchased years ago in Mykonos when the dreaded beast reared its unexpected head. After liberally rubbing it into my temples and the back of my neck, I stumble to the kitchen to make my tea.
Melissa (Lemon Balm) with Corsican mint on Neely’s Mint Mountain.
Not really knowing how to approach my assignment, I started drinking the tea at the beginning of the semester. In the following weeks as I was landscaping my yard, I covered a shady hillside with every variety of mint sold at the Natural Gardener: Pineapple mint, Chocolate mint, Orange Mint, Apple mint as well as the old standards of Spearmint and Peppermint. Today, in response to my migraine, I harvested some of the Spearmint but had trouble finding the lowgrowing peppermint underneath the taller variety. Perhaps it was a mistake to plant them all together. “If you’ve planted more than one mint in your garden together, you’ll soon only have one mint,” warns a fellow gardener, referring to mint’s bad habit of genetically mixing, or so I assume.
Aaaaaaahhhhh….the wild mint tea is starting to take effect. Wait. I have to close my eyes for a minute to reap the maximum benefit.
Mint has been used since before recorded history as an analgesic and pain reliever. Its mythology describes how a married Hades falls in love with a beautiful river nymph to the enragement of his wife, Persephone. Persephone is the maiden daughter of Demeter, Goddess of the harvest and fruitfulness of the land, and of the love a mother bears for her child. When her daughter was stolen away by Hades, Demetra (the Goddess in the pantheon along with Aphrodite, Goddess of lovers of truth and beauty and Hecate of the crossroads, that fascinates me most) in her bereavement, abandoned her post and introduced the seasons to the world through a negotiated return of her daughter for half the year.
After that kind of enslavement by the god of the underworld, it doesn’t surprise me that Persephone was pissed off when he took up with Mentha. That she merely turned Mentha into a plant is proof of her goodness and her fine lineage. A deprived and lustlorn Hades provided the scent and the medicinal properties so that his lover would be valued in the world of man.
And so she was.
The ancient Greeks rubbed wild mint into their dining tables, perhaps as a symbol of ‘filoxenia,’ or hospitality, as it is used in many cultures in the Mediterranean and Asian regions where it originated. It was often used as an air freshener and the Greeks and Romans used mint as a perfume for their baths, as an aphrodisiac and in food. (It is high in Vitamin A and Iron. For a full nutritional analysis of Spearmint, go to http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/spices-and-herbs/226/2.)
Since then, Mentha speciosa has been used in those ancient ways as well as medicinally and even Charlemagne encouraged its use for its therapeutic qualities. It took a foothold in English gardens in the 18thcentury when the English herbalist Culpepper prescribed it as a tonic for the stomach. Native Americans seem to have had their own varieties of mint even prior to the infusion of the colonists’ European varieties that they used dried or juiced--to both to repel and to alleviate the sting of their bites--fleas and ticks (pennyroyal); for pneumonia, as a blood purifier and as a bath to raise body temperature (catnip Nepeta cataria); and as an external application in typhus fever, rheumatism, deafness and cholera infantum (horsemint Monarda sp.) [Source: Native American Medicine, p 128 and 373).
With over 650 varieties of mint in the Lamiaceae (alternately known as the Labiatae) family, I could easily fill volumes on this one plant. While they all share general characteristics such as square stems, opposite leaves and aromatics, the Spearmint, or Mentha spicata, a New World introduction by colonists, “is an anti-inflammatory, calming, mucolytic, and a tonic for the digestive system. It has a wonderful ability, when inhaled, to create a feeling of joy and happiness and therefore makes an excellent addition to stress relief blends. It is indicated for all sorts of respiratory problems and chronic bronchitis."
Essential oil ofMentha piperita, or Peppermint, which seems to be a hybrid of Spearmint and Watermint (Mentha aquatica), contains up to 48% Menthol and up to 30% Menthone. Its properties “are cooling, viricide, tonic and stimulant, particularly to the heart, brain and pancreas. It has hormone-like properties that may regulate ovarian hormones. Use of the essential oil is indicated for insufficient liver or pancreas juices, flatulence and belching, headache and migraine, nerve pain and purulent eczema. It is a very good disinfectant for the air for seriously ill patients with AIDS, senility or those with high fever. For gas in the stomach, whether human or pets, one drop in half a glass of water, sipped slowly will do the trick. Peppermint oil diffused will cool any room, even if it is very hot."* (*Guide to [325] Essential Oils, by Jeanne Rose)
“Peppermint oil...inhibits gastrointestinal smooth muscle action in both laboratory animal preparations and in humans. Clinically, it has been used to reduce colonic spasm during endoscopy…and an enteric coated peppermint oil capsule has been used to treat irritable bowel syndrome. Enteric coating is necessary because menthol and other volatile compounds are rapidly absorbed. (Source: Encyclopedia of Natural Medicine.)
The Coriscan mint I planted between the pavers in my garden is quite tiny, like mint for little fairies. It is used to make the French digestif, Crème do Menthe. Pennyroyal (Mentha pulegium) has a strong, almost resinous flavor and is used as an emmenagogue and as an insect repellant. American False Pennyroyal (Hedeoma pulegioides) is used similarly as its volatile oil contains a liquid ketone identical to its European cousin. (Source: http://www.henriettesherbal.com/eclectic/bpc1911/hedeoma.html)
Several species of Monarda, also members of the Lamiaceae family, like Bee Balm or Horsemint, are native to Central Texas and have been used by herbalists for everything from disinfectant to furniture polish. (http://https://traditionalherbl.blogspot.com/search/label/Horsemint)
One variety, “the Japanese mint Mentha arvensis var. piperescens contains over 90% menthol.”
Spearmint, Chocolate mint, Pineapple mint, Peppermint, Orange mint, Apple mint on Neely’s Mint Mountain.
The chemical composition of their essential oils vary, but they all contain terpenes (organic compounds produced by plants like conifers and some insects like termites and swallowtail butterflies) and are major bio synthetic building blocks within every creature. Terpenes are released by trees in warm weather to seed clouds, allowing the forests to regulate the temperature of their environment.
The essential oils also contain Menthol, a waxy, crystalline substance with known anesthetic and counter irritant qualities that is widely used to relieve minor throat pain. “Menthol also acts as a weak kappa opioid receptor agonist (Source Wikipedia)” that bind opium like compounds in the brain and are responsible for mediating the effects of these compounds that include altering the perception of pain, consciousness, motor control, and mood. Kappa opioid receptors, and perhaps Menthol, may have therapeutic potential in the treatment of addiction.
What a plant. I love it because my migraine is gone. Truly, it is a gift of the Gods.
Menthol Crystal (Source: Patterns in Nature, p 28)
Orange mint and Peppermint with Sarsaparilla on Neely’s Mint Mountain
Pennyroyal on Neely’s Mint Mountain.
Neely’s Mint Mountain from above.
Sources:
Native American Medicine, p 128 and 373
Encyclopedia of Natural Medicine, p 611
Patterns in Nature, p 28
Thus Article Mint
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