White willow
Salix
- Known today as
- The bark and leaves of Salix alba.
- Kind
- Plant, in 1 older authority
- Constituents
- salicin, salicylic acid
- Earliest authority here
- Edward Stone (1702–1768)
- Qualities
- Cold and dry (Galenic tradition). What the degrees mean
- In other databases
- Plants of the World Online search · GBIF search · Wikidata search
Revised October 1, 2026: The mechanism corrected against ChEMBL. Version 1, first published September 25, 2026.
White willow: what was it used for?
Cooling and binding: the bark for agues, the leaves for pains and bleeding.
White willow: what does modern science say?
Its salicin is converted in the body to salicylic acid; aspirin, marketed in 1899, was made from the same chemistry.
Pharmacognosy & Toxicology
- Constituents
- salicin ChEMBLa prodrug
- salicylic acid ChEMBLits metabolite
- Mechanism
- Salicylic acid inhibits the cyclo-oxygenases only weakly in the test tube, by less than half at 10 µM, and does not acetylate them as aspirin does.
- Checked against ChEMBL
- salicylic acid: The entry once said “inhibits the cyclo-oxygenases”, and was corrected to what ChEMBL holds: Prostaglandin G/H synthase 1 (human), under 50% inhibition at 10 µM, so no dose-response curve was run, CHEMBL1909046; Prostaglandin G/H synthase 2 (human), under 50% inhibition at 10 µM, so no dose-response curve was run, CHEMBL1909046.
- Toxic dose
- As aspirin; the bark holds about 1 per cent salicin.
- Standing
- Approved in Europe as a traditional remedy for low back pain.
- Vlachojannis, J. E., et al. (2009). “A systematic review on the effectiveness of willow bark.” Phytotherapy Research 23. Verified against its record · doi:10.1002/ptr.2747
The abstract of each source, beneath its citation. For Club members. About the Club or sign in.
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.
White willow: what lore surrounds it?
Its use is older than Edward Stone’s report of 1763: the Ebers Papyrus of about 1500 BC already recommends willow for aches and pains, making it one of the oldest remedies with a modern medicine, aspirin, to show for it.
White willow: what did the older authorities say?
- Edward Stone
- The English clergyman reported to the Royal Society in 1763 that willow bark cured agues, reasoning that a remedy grows where the disease is found.
Sources
- Stone, E. (1763). An account of the success of the bark of the willow in the cure of agues. Philosophical Transactions 53. Verified against its record · doi:10.1098/rstl.1763.0033
- National Institutes of Health, on the story of aspirin and the Ebers Papyrus. Book, not indexed
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
- The mechanism read against ChEMBL (ChEMBL 37): curated mechanisms and measured activity
- Sources
- 3 cited: 2 verified against its record, 1 book, not indexed. 2 with the abstract on file.
- Corrections
- said salicylic acid inhibits the cyclo-oxygenases as aspirin does. In the DrugMatrix screen it inhibits COX-1 and COX-2 by less than half at 10 µM; the mechanism now calls the inhibition weak.
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.
Cite This Entry
Version 1 · first published September 25, 2026 · last revised October 1, 2026
- Chicago
“White willow.” In Materia Medica, edited by B. C. P. Statema. Version 1. The Thinking Press, 2026–. Last modified October 1, 2026. https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/white-willow.
- MLA
“White willow.” Materia Medica, edited by B. C. P. Statema, version 1, The Thinking Press, 1 Oct. 2026, thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/white-willow. Accessed 8 Oct. 2026.
- APA
White willow. (2026, October 1). In B. C. P. Statema (Ed.), Materia medica (Version 1). The Thinking Press. Retrieved October 8, 2026, from https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/white-willow
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See Also
Sharing salicin
Of the same qualities: cold and dry
Camphor · Vinegar · Chicory · Sandalwood · Coral, red · Rose · what the degrees mean →
Nearby in the alphabet
Wild bergamot · White lead (Basic lead carbonate) · Wild carrot, seed of (Queen Anne’s lace) · White hellebore · Wild garlic (Allium ursinum) · White arsenic (Arsenic trioxide) · Wild ginger · Weapon-salve
Historical description, not medical advice.