Spearmint

Spearmint: what was it used for?

Chiefly a kitchen herb, Grieve says, but its oil is stimulant, carminative and antispasmodic, like peppermint’s though weaker, and better suited to children’s complaints: two to five drops on sugar. A distilled water of spearmint was given for hiccough, flatulence and the giddiness of indigestion; the sweetened infusion, an ounce of the dried herb to a pint of boiling water, a wineglassful or less at a dose, for the troubles of infants and as a drink in fevers; and it was held a specific against nausea and vomiting and the pain of colic. Parkinson used the mints in baths with balm “to comfort and strengthen the nerves and sinews,” and inwardly to strengthen weak stomachs.

Spearmint: what does modern science say?

Spearmint tea is the one herb of this group with a story of its own in hormone research: in two small studies, in Turkey and England, it lowered free testosterone in women with hirsutism or polycystic ovary syndrome within days or weeks, though the hair itself has not yet been shown to change. The evidence is set out below.

Spearmint: what did the older authorities say?

Pliny, as Gerard quotes him

“The smell of Mint does stir up the minde and the taste to a greedy desire of meate”; and “it will not suffer milk to cruddle in the stomach, and therefore it is put in milk that is drunke, lest those that drinke thereof should be strangled.”

John Gerard

“The smelle rejoiceth the heart of man, for which cause they used to strew it in chambers and places of recreation, pleasure and repose, where feasts and banquets are made”; it is good against watering eyes and sores of the head, applied with salt to the bites of mad dogs, and laid on the stings of wasps and bees “with good success.”

Nicholas Culpeper, as Grieve gives him

Names nearly forty maladies for which mint is “singularly good”: smelled, “it is comfortable for the head and memory,” a decoction gargled cures sore mouths and gums, and rose leaves and mint, heated and laid on, “cause rest and sleep.”