Important: Safety Warning
This page prescribes plants as medicine according to pre-modern medical theory. Several of the plants named are toxic, correct identification is difficult, and the doses given have no scientific basis. Do not ingest or apply any preparation described here.
This information has been left in for historical purposes but should not be acted upon.
Cubebs
Cubebs are small berries, somewhat sweet, about the bigness of pepper-corns, yet not so black nor solid, but more ragged or crested, being either hollow, or having a kernel within it, of a hot taste, but not so fiery as pepper; and having each a short stalk on them like a tail: these grow on trees less than apple-trees, with leaves narrower than those of pepper; the flower is sweet, and the fruit groweth clustering together. The Arabians call them quabebe, and quabebe chini: they grow plentifully in Java; they are used so stir up venery, and to warm and strengthen the stomach, being overcome with phlegm or wind; they cleanse the breast of thick tough humours, help the spleen, and are very profitable for the cold griefs of the womb. Being chewed in the mouth with mastic, they draw rheum from the head, and strengthen the brain and memory.