Phytolacca acinosa (PROSEA)

Plant Resources of South-East Asia Introduction

List of species

1, flowering and fruiting stem; 2, flower; 3, young fruit; 4, mature fruit (Iskak Syamsudin)

Phytolacca acinosa Roxburgh

Protologue: Hort. bengal.: 35 (1814).

Family: Phytolaccaceae

• Phytolacca esculenta van Houtte (1848).

• Indian poke (En)
• Vietnam: thương lục nhỏ, thương lục.

Pakistan, India, Nepal, Bhutan, China, Taiwan, Korea and Japan; introduced in Vietnam, occasionally cultivated elsewhere, e.g. in the Philippines.

Young leaves are cooked and eaten as a vegetable. In Vietnam often cultivated in pots as a medicinal herb. P. acinosa is sometimes cultivated as an ornamental.

The roots are used in traditional medicine in Vietnam, both internally and externally; they are commonly used in Chinese medicine. In Japan, the entire plant is used as a diuretic, while in India, it is used to alleviate body pain.

• A perennial herb up to 2(-3) m tall, often with purplish stems.
• Leaves elliptical to ovate, up to 35 cm × 16 cm.
• Flowers in racemes generally shorter than leaves, bisexual, stamens 7-15 (often 10), sometimes in 2 whorls, carpels 6-9 (often 8), free in fruit.
• Fruit a depressed-globular 8-lobed berry, purple-black, with the lobes hardly connate.

In shady wet places. The roots of P. acinosa taste bitter-sour and pungent.

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• Phytolacca (Medicinal plants)

• Razali Yusuf