Camphor wood

Camphor wood

(notes on materia medica)

[synonyms] Cinnamomum camphora wood (Herba gleanings), Cinnamomum camphora wood (collection of medicinal materials), and wind blown powder (records of Guangxi Traditional Chinese Medicine).

[source] it is the wood of Cinnamomum camphora,

[plant morphology] camphor, also known as Zhanggong, Xiangzhang, Xiangrui, camphor, Fangzhang and Wuzhang.

Evergreen trees, 20-30 m high. The bark is grayish brown or yellowish brown, longitudinally split; the branchlets are light brown, smooth; the branches and leaves have camphor flavor. Leaves alternate, leathery, ovate elliptic to ovate, 6-12 cm long and 3-6 cm wide, apex acuminate, base obtuse or broadly cuneate, entire or undulate, dark green glossy above, grayish green or pink white below, glabrous, young leaves light red, veins 3 above base, raised glands in vein axils; petiole 2-3 cm long. Panicle axillary; flowers small, greenish white or yellowish, ca. 2 mm long; perianth 6-lobed, elliptic, ca. 2 mm long, inner surface densely villous; fertile stamens 9, anthers 4-locular; ovary ovate, smooth glabrous, style short, stigma capitate. Drupe globose, about 1 cm wide, purple black at maturity, base surrounded by persistent and enlarged perianth tube. The flowering period is from April to June. The fruit period is from August to November.

Cultivated or wild by the river, or in relatively humid flat land. It is distributed in Guangdong, Guangxi, Yunnan, Guizhou, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Anhui, Fujian, Taiwan, Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan, Sichuan, etc.

The root (Cinnamomum camphora root), bark (Cinnamomum camphora bark), leaf (Cinnamomum camphora leaf), fruit (Cinnamomum camphora seed) and crystal (camphor) extracted from wood, branch and leaf are also used for medicine. Please refer to the special section for details.

[collection] the trunk of camphor tree is usually cut in winter, sawed, cut into small pieces and dried in the sun.

[medicinal material] it is irregular wood block with reddish brown to dark brown appearance, and annual rings can be seen in the cross section. It is heavy and hard, with strong camphor aroma and cool taste. It is better to have large, complete and rich aroma.

Abundant in China's coastal areas, Guangxi, Jiangxi, Fujian, Taiwan, Hunan, Hubei, Sichuan, Yunnan and other places, with Taiwan's largest output.

In Sichuan area, there is a ship bottom board made of this product, which has been soaked and decayed for many years.

[chemical constituents] Cinnamomum camphora contains camphor and aromatic volatile oil. By vacuum distillation of camphor oil, 20% white oil (boiling point 160-165 ℃) containing 25-30% 1,8-cineole, α - pinene, camphene, limonene, etc., 24% red oil (boiling point 210-250 ℃) containing safrole, α - terpineol, carvacrol, syringol, etc., and 1% blue oil (boiling point 250-300 ℃) containing pichene, myrcene, α - camphorene, etc?. The roots of Cinnamomum camphora still contain Neolitsea zingiberene and bovine heart fruit alkaloid. The wood also contains c16-25 n-alkanes, c17-33 isoalkanes, C16, 20, 22, 24, 26, 28 alkanols (C26 alkanol accounts for about 50%), β - sitosterol, polyols, keto alcohols, etc. Propionic acid, butyric acid, valeric acid, hexanoic acid, octanoic acid, decanoic acid, lauric acid, myristic acid, stearic acid and oleic acid were also detected in bark. There are c16-33 n-alkanes in the leaves. The percentage of saturated fatty acid was 93%; the percentage of trisaturated acid, bisaturated acid, monosaturated acid and triglyceride was 80,17,1,2%. The content of camphor in leaves varied from 0.2% to 1.5%. The content of safrole in leaves ranged from 0.04% to 0.05%, which had nothing to do with season.

The leaves of Cinnamomum camphora var. camphora contain 0.83% of heavy volatile oil and 0.26% of light volatile oil. Heavy oil contains 80% safrole and 10% camphor; light oil contains 70% linalool and 1% camphor.

Camphene, α - pinene, Cymene, linalool, α - terpineol, camphor, citral, decanal, methylheptenone, 1,8-cineole and eugenol were found in the leaves of Cinnamomum camphora var. yunnanensis.

The fresh leaves of Cinnamomum camphora, one of the small varieties of Cinnamomum camphora, yield oil of 0.68-2%, camphor of about 50%, citral and methylheptene of about 42%, and 1,8-cineole, α - pinene, camphene and DL limonene. Another small variety of Cinnamomum camphora, Cinnamomum camphora, mainly contains terpene and 1,8-cineole.

The leaves and twigs of Cinnamomum camphora produced in Japan produce about 1% volatile oil and camphor. The residual oil after removing camphor accounts for about 10% of the volatile oil, including about 3% α - terpene, 8% β - elemene, 35% β - caryophyllene, 18% CARENE, 14% apine and 1% nerolidol. It was also reported that the main components of camphor oil at high boiling point (boiling point ＞ 215 °) were α - tunicamene, α - Sandalwood terpene, β - Sandalwood terpene and δ - pichenylene, with the content of more than 10%; it also contained γ - patchoulene, dihydroacorene, acorene, solanediene-9,11,1,6-dimethyl-4-isopropyl-7,8-dihydronaphthalene, β - elemene, caryophyllene, CARENE, etc. The sesquiterpenoids camphorenone, CAMPHORENOL and cumitol were also isolated from the blue oil. The branches and leaves of Cinnamomum camphora produced in Japan were stored for several days and then steam distilled. The volatile oil was 1-1.3%. The oil contained 90% alcohols, mainly linalool and camphor 2.1%.

[flavor] pungent, warm.

① "Materia medica collection": "pungent, warm, non-toxic. "

② Ben Cao Zai Xin: "it tastes bitter, warm and nontoxic. "

③ Guangxi Traditional Chinese medicine annals: "it is pungent in taste, warm in nature, and has little poison. "

[Guijing] Bencao Zaixin: "entering the liver, spleen and lung meridians. "

Functions and indications: dispelling wind and dampness, promoting qi and blood, and benefiting joints. Treatment of abdominal pain, beriberi, gout, scabies, traumatic injury.

① "Materia medica notes:" the main heart abdominal pain, cholera, abdominal distension, night food does not disappear, often spit sour water, wine boiling. Also make bath soup to treat beriberi, in addition to scabies wind itching. "

② New materia medica: "warming the blood, benefiting the joints, treating bone fracture, Qi inversion and blood stagnation, and being able to abortion. "

[usage and dosage] oral administration: decoct soup, 3-5 yuan; or soak in wine. External use: smoked and washed with boiling water.

[should avoid] pregnant women should not take it.

[selection] 1. Stomach pain: Cinnamomum camphora five coins, fried in water. (Jiangxi herbal medicine)

② Treatment of beriberi, phlegm, nausea, heart full of stuffy, no diet: camphor wood one or two (coated with ginger juice to make yellow), pound screen for powder. Regardless of the time, take porridge to drink to adjust the next money. (PU Ji Fang Zhang Mu SAN)

③ For the treatment of gout, the hands and feet are as cold as a tiger bite: take a bucket of camphor wood chips, boil it with a load of water, put the camphor wood chips in a big bucket, make people sit on the edge of the bucket, put a foot inside, and recommend a collar outside, so as not to let the soup gas into the eyes, for fear of damaging the eyes. (true story of Medicine)

④ Treatment of centipede bite: fresh camphor branches, fried two bowls. (selected prescriptions)

In the compendium of the famous treatise, it is said that "those who have to vomit cholera and dry cholera are very good when they are fried with camphor wood scraps. In addition, those who have been killed by evil soldiers are smoked with camphor wood and treated with medicine when they are in the Soviet Union. It is pungent and fragrant, which can remove dampness and ward off evil spirits. "

Chinese PinYin : Zhang Mu