# Wild rue (Ruta graveolens)

**Ruta silvestre**

**Known today as.** Either the wild form of *Ruta graveolens* or Syrian rue, *Peganum harmala*.

Kind: Plant  
Poisoning: Harmala alkaloids and the serotonin syndrome (https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/poisons/serotonergic)  
Toxic: yes

> **Caution.** 

## What did Canale use it for?

Among the amulet herbs: hung about the neck, and used in fumigations and decoctions against hexes (ch. 10; see [the amulet herbs](https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/the-amulet-herbs)).

## What does modern science say?

If *Peganum*, its seeds contain harmaline and related alkaloids used in hallucinogenic preparations, and they have long been burnt against the evil eye in Iran and neighboring lands.

## Pharmacognosy and toxicology

- **harmine**: 
- **harmaline**: 
- **vasicine**: 

**Mechanism.** Harmine and harmaline inhibit monoamine oxidase A reversibly, raising serotonin and dopamine, and bind the serotonin receptors; they are the same alkaloids as the ayahuasca vine’s.

**Dose.** Seed extracts of a few grams have brought convulsions and coma; fatalities are recorded.

**Standing.** No approved use; harmine is studied for its action on pancreatic beta cells and in depression.

## What lore surrounds it?

Folkard opens with the conjecture “that the Moly, which, according to Homer, Mercury gave to Ulysses as an antidote to the enchantress Circe's beverage, was the root of the wild Rue.” Rue was Herb of Grace “from the fact that the word rue means also ‘repentance,’” and Turner held that “it preserves chastity, being eaten; it quickeneth the sight, stirs up the spirits, and sharpeneth the wit.” Gerarde reports that the weasel, before fighting the serpent, “armeth her selfe by eating Rue.” Rue entered Mithridates' counter-poison and the “vinegar of the four thieves,” Piperno in 1625 had the epileptic hang it round the neck “renouncing at the time, in a stated formula, the devil and all his works,” and “in Venice, Rue is kept as a charm in a house, to maintain its good fortune.”

Thiselton-Dyer names the vervain and the rue as “two of those most frequently used as ingredients in the mystic cauldron,” rue having “entered so largely into magic rites” that it “was once much in request as an antidote against such practices; and nowadays, when worn on the person in conjunction with agrimony, maiden-hair, broom-straw, and ground ivy, it is said in the Tyrol to confer fine vision, and to point out the presence of witches.” Maury supposed its repute with witches came from “its being a narcotic and causing hallucinations.”

## What did the older authorities say?

**Pliny.** Gives polium “beaten up with wild rue in rain water” to assuage the pain of the sting of the asp.

## Sources

- Pliny the Elder, *Natural History* 21.84, trans. J. Bostock & H. T. Riley (1855), Perseus Digital Library.
- Folkard, R. (1884). *Plant Lore, Legends, and Lyrics*, “Rue.” Project Gutenberg #44638.
- Thiselton-Dyer, T. F. (1889). *The Folk-lore of Plants*. Project Gutenberg #10118.
- Moloudizargari, M., et al. (2013). *Pharmacognosy Reviews* 7.

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

Historical description, not medical advice.