Callicarpa candicans (PROSEA)

Plant Resources of South-East Asia Introduction

List of species

Callicarpa candicans (Burm.f.) Hochr.

Protologue: Candollea 5: 190 (1934).

Synonyms

• Callicarpa cana L. (1771).

Vernacular names

• Indonesia: apu-apu (Sundanese), meniran kebo, (Javanese), sesepo (Lampung)
• Malaysia: tampang besi, tampang besi merah
• Philippines: tigau (Bisaya, Bikol, Tagalog), palis (Tagalog), anuyup (Ibanag, Iloko)
• Cambodia: sroul kraham
• Laos: dok pha nok
• Vietnam: nàng nàng, trứng ếch, pha tốp.

Distribution

From southern China westward to eastern India and southward throughout South-East Asia to tropical parts of Australia and the Pacific.

Uses

In Peninsular Malaysia, a decoction of the young leaves is drunk to relieve abdominal troubles and amenorrhoea. In Java, the leaves are used for poulticing wounds to prevent swelling and on boils. An infusion is used as an emmenagogue. In the Philippines, the leaves are pounded and used as a fish poison. The leaves are smoked to relieve asthma. The leaves are externally applied as a plaster for gastralgia. In Vietnamese folk medicine, a decoction of roots and leaves is prescribed to women after parturition to restore appetite. Externally a decoction is employed as a wash for ulcers and boils.

Observations

• An evergreen shrub or small tree, 1-4(-6) m tall, stem and branches greyish-brown tomentose.
• Leaves very variable, elliptical-oblong, lanceolate or ovate-rotundate, (7-)10-20 cm × (2.5-)4-9(-11) cm, base cuneate, apex shortly acuminate, margin serrate-dentate, glandular and densely stellate tomentose beneath, stellate pubescent above when young, petiole 0.6-3(-4) cm long, stellate tomentose.
• Cyme stellate tomentose, primary peduncle shorter than the petiole, 0.5-1 cm long.
• Flowers subsessile, calyx minutely 4-toothed, 1-1.5 mm long, glandular and stellate hairy outside, corolla mauve or violet, tube 2 mm long, lobes broadly ovate, 3-3.5 mm long, with a few glands, stamens exserted, ovary globose, glabrous, glandular all over, style exserted, 5-6 mm long.
• Drupe depressed globular, 2 mm in diameter, almost succulent, glabrous, glandular, mauve, purple or deep red.

C. candicans is found in grasslands, brushwood, thickets, village groves and secondary forest, from sea-level up to 1000 m altitude.

Selected sources

• [74] Backer, C.A. & Bakhuizen van den Brink Jr, R.C., 1964—1968. Flora of Java. 3 volumes. Noordhoff, Groningen, the Netherlands. Vol. 1 (1964) 647 pp., Vol. 2 (1965) 641 pp., Vol. 3 (1968) 761 pp.
• [135] Burkill, I.H., 1966. A dictionary of the economic products of the Malay Peninsula. Revised reprint. 2 volumes. Ministry of Agriculture and Co-operatives, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Vol. 1 (A—H) pp. 1—1240, Vol. 2 (I—Z) pp. 1241—2444.
• [207] Corner, E.J.H., 1988. Wayside trees of Malaya. 3rd Edition. 2 volumes. The Malayan Nature Society, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. 774 pp.
• [407] Heyne, K., 1950. De nuttige planten van Indonesië [The useful plants of Indonesia]. 3rd Edition. 2 volumes. W. van Hoeve, 's-Gravenhage, the Netherlands/Bandung, Indonesia. 1660 + CCXLI pp.
• [739] Nguyen Van Duong, 1993. Medicinal plants of Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. Mekong Printing, Santa Ana, California, United States. 528 pp.
• [788] Pételot, A., 1952—1954. Les plantes médicinales du Cambodge, du Laos et du Vietnam [The medicinal plants of Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam]. 4 volumes. Centre National de Recherches Scientifiques et Techniques, Saigon, Vietnam.
• [810] Quisumbing, E., 1978. Medicinal plants of the Philippines. Katha Publishing Co., Quezon City, the Philippines. 1262 pp.

Main genus page

• Callicarpa (Medicinal plants)

Authors

• J.L.C.H. van Valkenburg & N. Bunyapraphatsara