Vnder this title of Dodder, I comprehend not onely Epithymum as the chiefest kinde thereof: but all the other sorts of laces or threads, that grow either upon hearbes and shrubbes, &c. or upon the ground: and because I would not speake of them in many places, (as I shall doe of the plants whereon they grow, in severall places of this worke) I though it more fitt to include them in one Chapter, and give you knowledge both of their formes and vertues, in one place rather then in many: I acknowledge I might more fitly have placed this plant among the purgers, but that for the names sake I would set it next unto the Tymes.
Epithymum. The Dodder of Tyme.
Cuscuta epithymum. -Henriette
Pliny setteth downe in the eigth Chapter of his 26. booke, two sorts of Epithymum, (which Matthiolus seemeth to confute) the one to be the flowers of Tyme as Dioscorides before him did, both greene and white, the other to be red haires growing without roote: now most of our moderne writers doe acknowledge but one kinde, & Tragus as I thinke, first mentioned both white & red strings, growing on severall hearbs, even as I have done also, which yet are but one and the same thing in it selfe, growing in the same manner upon Tyme or Savory, as it doth upon any other plant, being red on some hearbes, and white on others, as may bee observed on sundry plants on Hampstead heath.
It first from seedes giveth rootes in the ground, which shoote forth threads or stringes, grosser or finer, as the property of the plants whereon it groweth, and the climate doth suffer, (although Matthiolus and others, have thought it to grow without roote) creeping and spreading on that plant whereon it fasteneth, bee it high or low, clasping the very grasse if it meete with none else, (although Ruellius saith it groweth not on the grounde, but on hearbes) as upon some vines also in Narbone, as Pena saith he observed: these strings have no leaves at all upon them, but winde and enterlace themselves so thicke oftentimes upon a small plant, that it taketh away all comfort (as one would thinke) of the Sun from it, and ready to choake or strangle it; after these strings are risen up to that height, that they may draw nourishment from the plant, you shall scarse see any appearance of strings from the ground, they being broken off, either by the strength of their rising, or withered by the heate of the Sunne, (and if they meete with no herbe or plant whereon to spreade, they will soone perish of themselves, as I have tryed my selfe, by sowing the seedes in a pot by themselves, & so observed their springing) from whence divers have imagined, that it might grow as Mosse upon trees, or like Misselto; but I think rather as Ivie, by drawing nourishment insensibly from the plants whereon it groweth, & thereby partaketh of the nature of the same plants:
upon these strings of both sorts, & upon what plants or herbe soever they grow, are found clusters of small heads or huskes, out of which start forth whitish flowers, which afterwards give small pale coloured seede, somewhat flat and twice as bigge as Poppye seede: thus much I thought good to let all others understand, by that experience and observation I have had thereof: yet after this mine owne observation, I reade much to this purpose in Tragus, in his chapter of Audrosace or Cuscuta: by this which I have truely related, it may appeare plainely to any, that neither Tyme, Savory, or any other herbe, doe naturally of their owne seede bring these stringes or laces, but that they spring from their owne seede, either shed or scattered of themselves upon the ground, or comming among the seedes of other hearbs that are sowne. The plantes whereon these laces doe grow, are observed by divers, to be Vines, as Pena and others that have observed them in France, and in some places of Turkey, upon trees and thornes, and some other things; Theophrastus in the 23. chap. of his second booke of the causes of plants, doth set downe, that Cadytas groweth on trees and bushes in Syria, which Pliny altereth to Cassitas in the last chap. of his 16. booke, by which word no doubt they meant this plant, for it differeth not much from Cassita, as many others have it, or Cuscuta as it is generally called, the Arabian name being Chassnth and Cuscuth: the hearbs are Polium, Dictamus, Germander, Hysope, Mother of Tyme, Marjerome, Staebe, Wallwort, Rosemary, and others as Bauhinus hath recorded, and also very plentifully in many places of our owne land upon Nettles, and upon Lin or Flaxe, and called Podagra lini, and Angina lini, upon Tares also more aboundantly in some places, where it destroyeth the pulse, or at the least maketh it much worse, and is called of the Country people Hell-weede, because they know not how to destroy it; upon Fearne also and other hearbes upon Hampstead heath, as I lately found my selfe, the strings & flowers being white, and upon the grasse likewise on Black-heath in Kent, on the very ground, not rising an inch or two high, being red.
The place, Tyme, and Names
are sufficiently as I thinke expressed before, yet in particular, Tragus and Anguilara thinke it to be the Androsace of Dioscorides, but erroniously: for Epithymum as Matthiolus sheweth out of Aetius, Actuarius and others, is the threads or laces growing upon Tyme, although Dioscorides calleth it the flower thereof: we doe generally call that Epithymum that groweth on Tyme, in English, laced Tyme; as the Epithymbra, laced Savory, and so of Epistoebe, Epimajorana, Epiurtica, Epirubus, and so the rest; laced Stoebe, laced Marjerome, laced Nettles, laced Brambles: but wee call those strings generally by the name of Dodder, especially that which groweth on Flaxe and Tares, which are red and most frequent with us.
The Vertues.
Epithymum by Dioscorides, Paulus, Aetius, Actuarius, Mesues, and all others, is accounted the most principall and powerfull Dodder growing upon any herbe, (and that upon Savory or Stoebe not to bee so effectuall) for all melancholicke diseases, and to purge blacke or burnt choller, which is the cause of many diseases of the head and braines, as also for the trembling of the heart, faintings and swounings:
it is helpefull in all the diseases or griefes of the spleene, and of that melancholy that riseth from the windines of the Hypochondria, which is that part of the belly under the short ribbes where the spleene lyeth, & by flying up to the braine causeth a kinde of frensy or madnes:
it purgeth also the reines and kidneys by Vrine;
it profiteth them that have the Iaundise in opening the obstructions of the gall:
Galen saith, it hath the properties of Tyme being hot and dry in the third degree, & as Ruellius observeth from the Arabian authors, that it hath by the astriction or drying quality, a strengthning property beside the purging, as it is also found in Rubarbe, and that it is a safe medicine for the obstructions as well of the liver as spleene, purging the veines of flegmaticke & cholericke humours, & likewise as (Mesues saith, it helpeth childrens agues if a little wormeseed be put to it.
The Dodder of all other plants & herbes in like maner pertaketh of the nature of them whereon they grow, be they hot or cold, and is thought to worke more effectually for those diseases, wherunto the herbe it selfe is applyed: Lobel saith, that in the west parts of this kingdom where he found these laces upon Netles, the people had good experience, that it was a soveraigne remedy to procure plenty of Vrine, where it was stopped or hindred, & my selfe also have understood it from those parts:
But that Dodder which groweth upon Tares, being the most frequent about London, and wherewith our markets are onely in a manner furnished, and our Apothecaries shoppes stored from thence, taketh his propertie from the Tares whereon it groweth, and can have no effectuall quality comparable to Epithymum: for as Galen saith, Tares are hard of digestion and binde the bellye, and that the nourishment of them engendereth thicke blood, apt to turne into melancholie, which qualities are cleane contrary to those of Epithymum, Epithymbra, or of other good herbes.
