Wild garlic
Ramsons; herba salutaris
- Known today as
- Allium ursinum. A broad-leaved, strongly garlic-scented woodland plant that carpets damp ground with white starry flowers each spring.
- Kind
- Plant, in 1 older authority
- Constituents
- alliin and allicin, ajoene, vinyldithiins, and 1 more
- Earliest authority here
- Pliny (AD 23/24–79)
- In other databases
- Plants of the World Online search · GBIF search · Wikidata search
Revised October 1, 2026: An older authority added from a text read in full. Version 1, first published September 27, 2026.
Caution. Its leaves are easily confused with poisonous lookalikes; crush and smell before eating.
Wild garlic: what was it used for?
Eaten as a spring green and flavoring since prehistory, and taken as a general tonic, herba salutaris, “the healing herb,” by Celtic, Gaelic, Teutonic, and Roman herbalists alike.
Wild garlic: what does modern science say?
Like cultivated garlic it contains allicin and related sulfur compounds and is mildly antimicrobial. Foragers regularly and dangerously confuse its leaves with those of lily-of-the-valley and autumn crocus, which grow in similar places.
Pharmacognosy & Toxicology
- Constituents
- alliin and allicinthe sulfur chemistry of garlic, at lower levels
- ajoene ChEMBL
- vinyldithiins
- quercetin and kaempferol glycosides
- Mechanism
- Ramsons share garlic’s thiosulfinates, antibacterial and antiplatelet, in the leaf; the spring tonic of the Gaels had a vitamin C and sulfur rationale. Its yearly danger is confusion with lily-of-the-valley and autumn crocus by foragers, which kills.
- Toxic dose
- A food; the mimics are the danger.
- Standing
- A food; garlic, not ramsons, has the EMA monograph.
- Sobolewska, D., et al. (2015). “Allium ursinum: botanical, phytochemical and pharmacological overview.” Phytochemistry Reviews 14. Verified against its record · doi:10.1007/s11101-013-9334-0
- Brvar, M., et al. (2004). “Acute poisoning with autumn crocus (Colchicum autumnale L.).” Wiener Klinische Wochenschrift 116. Verified against its record · doi:10.1007/bf03040489
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.
Wild garlic: what lore surrounds it?
Its species name, ursinum, “of the bear,” is traditionally explained by the belief that bears, waking from hibernation, dig up and eat the bulbs to restore their strength. Its English name, ramsons, descends from the Old English hramsa, an older word for garlic.
Wild garlic: what did the older authorities say?
- Pliny
- Among the garlics Pliny notes one “that grows spontaneously in the fields, and is known by the name of ‘alum,’” which, boiled and scattered on sown ground, so stupefies the birds that eat it “as to be taken with the hand even.” He then adds the plant itself: “There is a wild garlic, too, generally known as ‘bear's’ garlic; it has exactly the smell of millet, with a very small head and large leaves.”
Sources
- Wikipedia, “Allium ursinum.” Book, not indexed
- Pliny the Elder, Natural History 19.33, trans. J. Bostock & H. T. Riley (1855), Perseus Digital Library. Primary text
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
- Each quotation from the older authorities checked word for word against the text, read in full
- Sources
- 4 cited: 2 verified against its record, 1 primary text, 1 book, not indexed. 2 with the abstract on file.
- 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.
Cite This Entry
Version 1 · first published September 27, 2026 · last revised October 1, 2026
- Chicago
“Wild garlic.” 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/wild-garlic.
- MLA
“Wild garlic.” Materia Medica, edited by B. C. P. Statema, version 1, The Thinking Press, 1 Oct. 2026, thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/wild-garlic. Accessed 8 Oct. 2026.
- APA
Wild garlic. (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/wild-garlic
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See Also
Sharing ajoene, quercetin and kaempferol glycosides
Also in Pliny the Elder
Wild rue in Pliny the Elder · Wild carrot, seed of in Pliny the Elder · Woad in Pliny the Elder · Wax in Pliny the Elder · everything Pliny the Elder names →
Drawing on the same sources: Wikipedia
Nearby in the alphabet
Wild ginger · Wild bergamot · Winter-grain mould (Pink and white moulds of grain left in the field over winter) · White willow (The bark and leaves of Salix alba) · Witch ball (often silvered or colored, hung in the window) · White lead (Basic lead carbonate)
Historical description, not medical advice.