Chestnut Trichosanthes kirilowii Maxim., Cucurbitaceae
Legend has it that there is a high mountain in Jiangnan with a fairy cave house, and the clouds are all over the day. There was a woodcutter who made a living collecting firewood. One day at noon, while he was chopping firewood and resting, he followed the sound of spring water to the mouth of a cave, drank enough water, and lay down on a stone slab in the shade of a tree to rest. In a trance, he heard someone talking, and when he opened his eyes, he saw two old men talking. The black-bearded old man said, "This year we have a big pair of golden melons in our hole." The white-bearded old man waved his hand: "Shh, whisper, there is a wood chopper lying over there, beware of stealing our precious golden melon." Blackbeard disagreed, "Afraid of something, he can't get into the hole." Only at the beginning of July, at noon, can we say, 'The gate of heaven is open, and the owner of the golden melon must come in.' Whitebeard got angry: "Don't say it, let's play chess." Hearing this, the woodcutter rolled down the stone slab and woke up, which turned out to be a dream. What old man is there? Frustrated, he picked up the firewood and went home. Later, the more he thought about it, the more magical he felt: "Could it be that I met a god, and that cave really hides treasures?" He decided to give it a try. At noon on the seventh day of the first month of July, he arrived at the cave, chanting a mantra, and the door opened with a loud bang. The woodcutter walked in, only to see that there was really a turquoise vine growing inside, and there was a pair of golden melons on it. He happily picked the golden melon and ran home in one breath. When he arrived home, he was stunned, which is the golden melon, it is clearly two ordinary small round melons. Disappointed, he tossed the melon aside.
After some time, the woodcutter went up the hill again to cut firewood, and involuntarily he went to the outside of the cave again, lying on the stone slab and resting. Just after closing my eyes, I heard the conversation between the two old men. Whitebeard complained, "I blame you for talking too much, our golden melon has been stolen." Blackbeard said, "What are you afraid of, and it's not gold." Whitebeard said, "But it's a precious medicinal herb, more valuable than gold." Only people who have a good heart will use it, and the skin color of the melon will be red to have the effect of moisturizing the lungs and clearing the heat. "The woodcutter woke up and thought as he went home, could this be another dream of the gods, asking me to plant medicinal herbs to cure people's diseases?" When he got home, he found the two melons that had rotted, took out the seeds, and planted them in the yard the following spring. By the autumn, there were a lot of melons. He took the melon and dried it and gave it to the patients who coughed and sputum, and all of them worked. After that, he planted it every year and gave it to the sick family, and he did not take anything. People respected him and asked him to give this melon a name, and he thought about it and said it, so he called it "melon". Later, the name was gradually written as "Chestnut Tower".
Photo from China Digital Herbarium
【Aliases】 Dilou (Benjing), Zeju, Zeye (Wupu Bencao), Gua Kui (Acupuncture Jia Yi Jing), Zegu, Cucumber (Beilu), Tianyuanzi (Eastern Medical Treasure Book), Persimmon Melon (Medical Forest Compendium), Wild Bitter Melon (Guizhou Folk Medicine Collection), Du Gua, Big Belly Melon (Zhejiang Traditional Chinese Medicine Manual), Medicine Melon (Sichuan Traditional Chinese Medicine), Duck Melon (Guangdong Traditional Chinese Medicine), Root Name BaiYao, Smallpox Pollen, Ruixue
[Source] Is the fruit of the Cucurbitaceae plant Trichosanthes kirilowii Maxim. and the Chinese Chestnut Trichosanthes rosthornii Harms.
【Original form】Perennial herbaceous vine, up to 10 m long. The roots are thick. The stem is climbing, multi-branched, with a shallow longitudinal groove on the surface, smooth and glabrous; tendrils are axillary, slender, and the apex is 2-pointed. The leaves are nearly heart-shaped, 12 to 20 cm long and 20 cm wide, often 5 to 7 shallow lobes, lobes are inverted ovate, sharply pointed or short tapering at the apex, with sparse teeth at the edges, and loose soft hairs on both sides when young. The flowers are unisexual, hermaphroditic; male flowers are 3 to 8, arranged in a total inflorescence, sometimes solitary; calyx-shaped, 2.5 to 4 cm long, sepals 5, linear and inverted, 1 to 1.5 cm long; corolla white, lobes 5, inverted ovate, the apex is finely lobed into tassels; stamens 3, filaments are 4 to 6 mm long; female flowers are solitary, sepals, petals are slightly the same as male flowers; inferior ovary, long ovate, peduncle length, stigma 3 deeply lobed, filamentous. The fruit is oval to broadly oval, orange-yellow and smooth when ripe. The seeds are mostly flattened and yellowish brown when ripe. Flowering period is from July to August. The fruiting period is from September to October. It is distributed in most parts of our country. It grows in hillside grasses, forest edges, and shady valleys. The main products are Shandong, Anhui, Henan and other places.
【Preparation】When the frost falls to the ripening of the lidong fruit, and the surface of the peel begins to have white powder and is yellowish, it can be harvested. Cut off the fruit stalk, weave the fruit handle into a bunch, first pile up in the house for 2 to 3 days, and then hang it in a cool and ventilated place to dry (about 2 months); then cut off the fruit stalk, wash it, steam it in a steamer basket until it is slightly soft, flatten it, and cut into pieces.
【Sexual taste】Sweet and bitter, cold. 【Returning to the meridian】Into the lungs, stomach, large intestine meridian.
【Functional indications】The main quenching thirst, the body is full of heat, and the heat is great. Make up for the deficiency, continue to be injured. The real lord chest paralysis, the face of the people. Stems and leaves are therapy for heat injuries. Moisturize the lungs, dissolve phlegm, scatter knots, slip the intestine. Cure sputum fever cough, chest palsy, chest nodules, pulmonary fistula cough blood, jaundice, constipation, carbuncle swelling onset. 【Dosage】Internal use: decoction, 3 to 4 dollars; mash the juice or into the pills, scatter. External use: mashing.
【Note】 Spleen and stomach deficiency and cold, false stool, cold phlegm, wet phlegm should not be suitable. Goji berries are made for it. Evil dried ginger. Cow's knees, dry paint. Anti-aconitum.
【Appendix】
Cure children's diaphragm fever cough phlegm and asthma for a long time without panic: a building, go to the end of the child, with noodles and cakes, and the yellow is the end. One dollar per serving, under warm lactose, three times a day, the effect is stopped. ("Xuanming On the Fang" runs the lungs and scatters)
Cure asthma: two chestnut towers, one piece of alum, such as jujube large, into the chestnut, calcination, for the end. Boil the radish, dip it in the powder and take it, the juice is over the mouth. ("Pu Ji Fang" 栝蒌散)
Cure small knot chest disease, is under the heart, according to the pain, pulse floating slippery: huang lian one or two, half summer (washing) half a liter, the big one of the building. On the three flavors, take six liters of water, first boil The Chestnut Tower, take three liters, go to the water, the medicines, boil two liters, go to the water, and take three servings at temperature. ("On Typhoid Fever" small trap chest soup)
Cure chest palsy, wheezing and coughing, chest and back pain, shortness of breath, deep and late pulse, close a small number: a building (pound), half a pound of white, seven liters of white wine. On the three flavors, take two liters from the same boil, divide and serve again. ("Jin Kuai Yao Yao Bao" 栝蒌薤白白酒汤)
Cure chest paralysis can not lie down, heartache through the back: a building (pound), xuebai three two, half summer half a pound, liquor a bucket. On the four flavors, take four liters with boiling, take one liter warmly, and take three times a day. ("Golden Essentials" Chestnut White Half Summer Soup)
Cure lung impotence and cough up blood: 50 chestnuts (Lian Lu, tile roast), 50 ume meat (roasted), almonds (peeled, pointed, fried) 21. at the end. Each twist, take a slice of pig lung thinly, mix into the inside, cook, cold chew swallow, two times a day. (General Records of Saint Francis)
Cure vomiting blood: take the upright building, wrap it with paper tendons and mud, leave a glance at the top, calcination, merge in the pit, and go to the mud to scatter. Three money daggers per serving, glutinous rice drink down. ("General Records of Saint Francis", Black God Scatter)
Cure thirst fever or distraction: a yellow fat chestnut building, washed with a cup of wine, take the urn, peel, seed, fry into a paste, into the end of the alum one or two, and pills such as sycamore large. At any time of each serving, drink ten pills with porridge. ("Saint Huifang")
Cure children jaundice, spleen hot eye yellow, and cure wine yellow: Chestnut house green roasting as the end. One dollar per serving, one lamp of water, fry seven points, go to the decanter, take it in bed, and five more diarrhea under the yellow object Like. ("Pu Ji Fang" is scattered by yellow)
Cure cradle carbuncle and all carbuncles at the beginning, swelling and pain will disappear, pus will collapse, pus will heal: one lilou (rotten), half of raw flour grass, angelica (wine washing), frankincense, myrrh each one dollar. Serve fried with wine and serve for a long time. ("Woman's Recipe" Divine Effect Melon Scattering)
Cure alcoholism, phlegm vomiting, two flanks swelling and pain, panting up, no food and drink: li lou one or two, the last half of the divine comedy two (slightly fried). The medicine is pounded into scattered. For each serving, adjust the two dollars with onion and white wine. ("Saint Huifang")
Cure intestinal wind and blood: Li Lou (burned to ash), red adzuki beans in half. On the second taste, the pestle is the end. Hollow wine toned down a money dagger. (General Records of Saint Francis)
Cure heat tour Dan red swelling: the end of the two big two, vinegar adjustment. ("Milk Production Collection Test")
Cure the first outbreak of stool poison: one Huang Li Lou, Huang Lian five money. Serve fried in water. ("Forever Class Plutonium Fang")
Cure phlegm cough more than one: Li Lou Ren one or two, Wen Clam seven points. For the end, with ginger juice clear thick feet, pills marbles large. Oh yes. ("Picking Yuanfang") Cure alcohol and phlegm, save the lungs: Qing Dai, Li LouRen. On the end, ginger (juice), honey balls. Pouting. (Danxi Heart Law)
Cure breast carbuncle swelling and pain: four dollars for chestnut skin, five dollars for dandelion. Decoct the soup. ("Commonly Used Chinese Herbal Medicine in Shanghai") (34) Cure tooth pain: chestnut skin, dew beehive, burn ash and rub teeth; rinse with wuus root, jing chai root, green onion root decoction soup. ("The World's Medicine Works")
【Remarks】Belonging to the same genus, Jinggang Chestnut Tower Trihosanthes jinggangshanica C. H. Yueh, Xianggui Chestnut Tower Trihosanthes hylonoma Hand.-Mazz., Multi-tendrils Chestnut Tower Trihosanthes rosthornii Harms var. The fruit of multicirrata (C. Y. Sheng et Yueh) S. K. Chen, Trichosanthes laceribractea Hayata, also used as a chestnut in a few areas.
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