Product Review

Motherwort is a mint with dull green, hairy leaves and an intensely bitter taste. The botanical name Leonurus refers to a fanciful resemblance of the leaves to a lionÕs tale. One rather odd Hindu tale relates that if you make a tea of motherwort and add it to the laundry when you wash your socks and underwear, you will bring peace to your home. Motherwort contains caffeic acid 4-rutinoside. Diterpenes of the labdane type, such as leocardin, a mixture of two epimers of 8b-acetoyx-9a, l3a, l5, l6-bisepoxy-l5-hydroyx-7-oxo- labdan-6b, l9-olide. Flavonoids; rutin, quinqueloside, genkwanin, quercitin, quercetrin, isoquercetrin, hyperoside, and apigenin and kaempferol glucosides. Iridoids: leonuride and others not yet identified.