July 23, 2026
AGRIMONY
The Agrimony or Egrimony (Agrimonia Eupatoria) was a herb much in vogue among the old herbalists, who attributed extraordinary virtues to it. Dioscorides prescribes it as a cure for the bitings and stingings of serpents. Gerarde says it is “good for them that have naughty livers,” and in fact it was at one time known as Liver-wort. Culpeper tells us that it will draw forth “thorns and splinters of wood, nails, or any other such thing gotten into the flesh,” and recommends it further as “a most admirable remedy for such whose lives are annoyed either by heat or cold.” Sore throat, gout, ague, colic, ear-ache, cancers, and ulcers are among the numerous complaints the herbalists professed to cure by means of syrups and salves made of Agrimony, a plant which has formed an ingredient in most of the herb teas which have been from time to time introduced.
The astrological government and virtues of Agrimony appear to the uninitiated somewhat complicated. If we may believe Culpeper, it is a herb under Jupiter and the sign Cancer, and strengthens those parts under the planet and sign, and removes diseases in them by sympathy; and those under Saturn, Mars, and Mercury by antipathy, if they happen in any part of the body governed by Jupiter, or under the signs Cancer, Sagittarius, or Pisces.
Michael Drayton, in his ‘Muse’s Elysium,’ thus refers to Agrimony, among other herbs dear to simplers:—