Malabar nut
Arusa, adulsa, bakas, bansa; Sanskrit sinha-mukhi, ‘lion-mouthed’, and atarusha; Justicia adhatoda L.; Adhatoda vasica Nees; in pharmacy Adhatodae vasicae folium, Malabar nut leaf
- Known today as
- Justicia adhatoda, a shrub of the family Acanthaceae common throughout India, from the Punjab and Assam to Ceylon. Grieve describes the fresh leaves as four to six inches long and two wide, lance-shaped and entire, which dried turn a dull brownish green, “taste bitter and smell like strong tea.” She names the bitter alkaloid vasicine among their constituents. Its soft wood, she adds, makes excellent charcoal for gunpowder.
- Kind
- Plant, in 1 older authority
- Constituents
- vasicine
- Earliest authority here
- Dymock, Warden, and Hooper, Pharmacographia Indica (1893)
- In other databases
- Plants of the World Online · GBIF · Wikidata
Caution. Because of those possible effects on the womb and on implantation, the European agency considered further information on reproductive safety necessary. Grieve warns that large doses irritate the gut and cause diarrhoea and vomiting.
Malabar nut: what was it used for?
A remedy for the chest. Dymock, Warden, and Hooper record that the shrub had a considerable reputation all over India as an expectorant and antispasmodic, prescribed in consumption and other chest complaints with cough and hectic fever; Sanskrit writers directed the fresh juice of the leaves with honey and long pepper for cough. Grieve records that in India the leaves were dried and smoked as cigarettes to relieve asthma.
Malabar nut: what does modern science say?
The European Medicines Agency’s herbal committee declined to adopt a monograph on the leaf (public statement of 2013). Evidence of traditional use came mainly from India, with incomplete information on preparations and dosing; no single-ingredient product was found in the European Union and no specific evidence of traditional use in Europe. It also found information suggesting possible abortive, anti-implantation, and uterotonic effects, and called for more information on reproductive toxicity.
Pharmacognosy & Toxicology
- Constituents
- Mechanism
- Not established in the sources read for this entry.
- Standing
- There is no European monograph: the European Medicines Agency’s herbal committee declined to adopt one (public statement of 2013), calling for more information on reproductive toxicity.
- European Medicines Agency, Committee on Herbal Medicinal Products. Public statement on ema_adhatodae-vasicae-folium. EMA/HMPC/681468/2012, 9 July 2013. Read in full · the text read
- Grieve, M. A Modern Herbal, “Malabar Nut.” As published on botanical.com. Read in full · the text read
Constituent names open the compound’s record at PubChem, and “ChEMBL” beside a name opens its record at ChEMBL, the European Bioinformatics Institute’s database of bioactive molecules. Where a mechanism line was checked against ChEMBL (ChEMBL 37, read 1 October 2026), the check is shown with the measured value and its source paper, or says plainly that nothing has been measured. Doses are as the references give them, for description only; this is not medical advice. Each source carries the result of its check against Crossref, PubMed, or the authority’s page: see Verification.
Malabar nut: what lore surrounds it?
The fruit, Dymock, Warden, and Hooper add, was sometimes hung round the necks of children to keep them from catching cold; in Ceylon, after Ainslie, the tree grew to fourteen or fifteen feet and was called Wanapala.
Malabar nut: what did the older authorities say?
- Dymock, Warden, and Hooper, Pharmacographia Indica (1893)
- Dutt, they write, records a saying that no one suffering from consumption need despair as long as this plant exists. The Nighantas describe it as removing phlegm, bile, and impurities of the blood; a Persian author on Indian drugs says that the wood was used to make toothpicks and gunpowder.
Sources
- Grieve, M. A Modern Herbal, “Malabar Nut.” As published on botanical.com. Read in full · the text read
- Dymock, W., Warden, C. J. H., & Hooper, D. (1893). Pharmacographia Indica, vol. 3, “Adhatoda vasica.” Internet Archive, b20413415_003. Read in part · the text read
- European Medicines Agency, Committee on Herbal Medicinal Products. Public statement on ema_adhatodae-vasicae-folium. EMA/HMPC/681468/2012, 9 July 2013. Read in full · the text read
Verification
- Checked
- October 1, 2026
- Passes
- Every sentence read against its sources, in the pass over the remaining 343 entries
- The Standing line checked against the authority it names (EMA, WHO, FDA, CITES, Commission E)
- Every dated or regulatory claim checked by category across the database
- Sources
- 3 cited: 2 read in full, 1 read in part.
- Corrections
- None were needed.
What was checked, how, and what was found is set out on the Verification page. A checked source is one whose record was found; it does not make the entry medical advice.
Club members can point at a technical term in this entry, such as a constituent, an action, or a word of Jung’s, to read its definition from the source. The Club.
Cite This Entry
Version 1 · first published October 17, 2026
- Chicago
“Malabar nut.” In Materia Medica, edited by B. C. P. Statema. Version 1. The Thinking Press, 2026–. Last modified October 17, 2026. https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/malabar-nut.
- MLA
“Malabar nut.” Materia Medica, edited by B. C. P. Statema, version 1, The Thinking Press, 17 Oct. 2026, thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/malabar-nut. Accessed 17 Oct. 2026.
- APA
Malabar nut. (2026, October 17). In B. C. P. Statema (Ed.), Materia medica (Version 1). The Thinking Press. Retrieved October 17, 2026, from https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/malabar-nut
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See Also
Sharing vasicine
Drawing on the same sources: Grieve, Dymock
Mallow and marshmallow · Madonna lily · Manna · Marking-nut electuary · Centella · Picrorhiza · the bibliography →
Historical description, not medical advice.
