# Feverfew (Tanacetum parthenium)

**Parthenium**

**Known today as.** *Tanacetum parthenium*.

Kind: Plant

> **Caution.** Not for pregnancy.

## What was it used for?

For headaches, fevers, and the womb.

## What does modern science say?

Some trials suggest it modestly reduces migraine; results are mixed. Parthenolide, its chief lactone, acts on the chemistry of inflammation in the laboratory, but the amount in sold products varies forty-fold, and the Cochrane reviews find the evidence for migraine prevention no more than suggestive. Chewing the fresh leaf causes mouth ulcers in some, and stopping after long use can bring rebound headaches.

## Pharmacognosy and toxicology

- **parthenolide**: 

**Mechanism.** Parthenolide inhibits NF- B and the release of serotonin from platelets.

**Dose.** Mouth ulcers from the fresh leaf; rebound headache on stopping.

**Standing.** No approved use; the evidence for migraine is inconclusive.

## What lore surrounds it?

Its revival came from a Welsh doctor’s wife in the 1970s who found that a few leaves a day, chewed in bread, kept off her migraines; the story spread through the British press, and a trial at the City of London Migraine Clinic in 1985 followed. In the United States the plant is called “bachelor’s buttons.”

## What did the older authorities say?

**Dioscorides.** Gives *parthenion* for inflammations and for the womb, whence its name, from *parthenos*, the maiden.

**Culpeper.** Sets it under Venus, and says it is “a general strengthener of the womb,” and that the herb bruised and applied to the wrists takes away the fits of an ague.

## Sources

- Dioscorides, *De materia medica*.
- Grieve, M. *A Modern Herbal*, “Feverfew.” As published on botanical.com.
- Johnson, E. S., et al. (1985). “Efficacy of feverfew as prophylactic treatment of migraine.” *BMJ* 291.
- Culpeper, N. (1652). *The English Physitian*.
- Johnson, E. S., et al. (1985). *BMJ* 291.

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*Feverfew.* In *Materia Medica*, edited by B. C. P. Statema. Version 1, revised 2026-10-01. The Thinking Press. https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/feverfew

Historical description, not medical advice.