Walnut
(Juglans nigra)(Juglans regia L.,
Juglandaceae)
Description: Description: Tree up to 30m (98 ft) high, rarely
as a shrub. Leaves up to 40cm (16in) long, imparipinnate of 7-11 leaflets
each up to 15cm (6in) long with midrib very distinct on the lower surface.
Flowers unisexual, the males in pendulous catkins; female flowers indistinct
in groups of 2-5 at the apices of branches. Fruit with a thick fleshy wall.
Leaves and fruit wall have an aromatic odour and a bitter taste.
The leaflets vary in size on the same leaf, which has seven to nine leaflets
- they are from 2¼ to 4 inches in length and 1 to 1½ inches wide,
parchment like when dry, leafstalks brown. The bark occurs in curved pieces
3 to 6 inches long and about 1 inch broad, dull, blackish brown, tough, fibrous
and mealy. The taste of both leaves and bark is bitter but the odour of the
leaves is aromatic.
Parts Used: Dried leaflets, fresh fruit walls, the bark
and leaves.
Habitat and Collection: Generally cultivated in Britain and
throughout Europe. The leaves are collected in early summer (before mid-July)
and are rapidly dried in the shade at not greater than 40-C (104"F) (slow
drying produces a blackish-brown drug). The fruit walls are removed from the
ripe fruits.
Constituents and Action: Tannin, a little volatile oil, juglone
(active in mycoses), hydrojuglone and other little-known substances. The fruit
wall is rich in vitamin C. Action is anti-inflammatory on mucosa and as a
general tonic.
Medicinal use: Excellent in the treatment of herpes and
when there is burning and itching of the skin of an eczematous nature lasting
a long time and leaving the affected parts blue and swollen.
Culpeper said: 'The kernels, when they grow old, are more oily and unfit
to be eaten, but are then used to heal the wounds of the sinews, gangrenes
and carbuncles'. And, 'The distilled water of the green leaves in the end
of May, cures foul running ulcers and sores to be bathed with wet cloths or
sponges applied to them every morning'.
Dr. Fernie said: 'The walnut has been justly termed vegetable arsenic
because of it's curative virtues in eczema and other obstinate conditions
of the skin'.
Directions for use: The leaves are used mainly as a tisane
(a handful in 1 litre (1 '75pt) or water and allow to stand) taken internally
for suppurations and skin eruptions. More rarely a tisane (50g (1.75oz) in
1 litre (1'75pt) of water) is used as an application to these eruptions. Its
action as a vermifuge is uncertain and it has only a weak action on diabetes.
The production of active preparations from the fruit wall is complex and should
be left to the pharmacist.
An infusion is made by pouring 1 pint of boiling water on 1 oz. of the bark
or leaves. This mixture should be strained when cool and a wineglassful taken
three times daily. This same infusion may be applied externally to all skin
eruptions.
Other uses: The roots, leaves and rind yield a brown dye
which is supposed to contain iodine and which gipsies employ for staining
their skins. It also dyes the hair black.
Points of interest: It is not known exactly when walnut
trees were brought to Britain but Pepys wrote: 'To Nonsuch, to the Exchequer
by appointment, and walked up and down the house and park ... a great walk
of an elme and a walnutt set one after another in that order . . . ' Nonsuch
was one of Henry's VIII's great palaces which indicates the trees were probably
planted in his reign.
Walnut trees live to a great age and it is said that there is one in Balaclava
around one thousand years old.
