Herbal Medicine for Preppers: Violet

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Hey, y'all. Welcome to this week's show. So, you know, it's kind of funny. I start so many shows saying this is one of my favorite herbs that, I mean, I really feel like it's, you know, something I overuse. But in this case, it really is because this is an edible plant as well as a medicinal plant. And, wow, it is so common. It is so overlooked. It is, I don't even know. I mean, I would put this on the same level as the dandelion, except a lot of people have these growing in their yard and don't even see them. So, I mean, not long ago, violets, this is viola species, were among the most important plants in the Appalachian Mountains. And the reason was, after a long, cold winter of eating salted, dried, and smoked food, and stored potatoes, and cabbage. Cabbage is what people really survived on. Smoked pork and cabbage was the staple, without a doubt. But violets were among the first greens in the spring. And see, they're native to the Americas. People brought in dandelions and such. So violets can be found really most anywhere. And I'm talking like small wood violets. I'm not talking like Johnny Jump Ups or something, the big nice ones. But everybody grew violets in their flower garden. The point of the flower garden was not so much for looks and the scent of nice flowers, which, you know, that's part of it. It was mainly herbal medicine. And in the case of violets, they were full of vitamin C. And violets and other spring plants were known as blood cleansers, just what they called them back then, and were used to prevent sickness, to prevent scurvy, to boost the immune system, to give you a little bit of fiber in the spring after a long winter of eating salt pork and potatoes, you know. Yeah. And the thing about violets is there are like 600 varieties of I mean, everywhere. They grow everywhere. And they're cheerful little flowers, you know. I mean, who doesn't like to see a violet? I mean, they're just pretty little flowers. They're called violets because they're generally purple, okay. But they can really vary in color dramatically. The viola tricolor, the Johnny Jump up, is also known as heartsease or pansy. Why is it called heartsease? Well, first of all, it's very colorful. I mean, it's got, gosh, I mean, it's one of the most attractive and varied flowers in the entire garden. And I mean, it's really very nice. And you should absolutely grab a pack of Johnny Jump Up seeds for like two bucks at Dollar General or something, Dollar Tree, you know, whatever, and just toss them out. I mean, why? Well, they contain salicin. Not only are they full of vitamin C, not only are they really tasty, You can take the flowers of violets and candy them, put them on cakes and such. Some of them have edible leaves, but they contain salicin, which is natural aspirin. So why is it hard to use? Well, because actually taking a tea or eating this plant can help with chest pains, can help prevent a heart attack. I mean, this is the biggest no-brainer there is. You could be in... you know, an HOA, POA, whatever they call those stupid things. And they say you can't grow any, you know, vegetables. You can only grow flowers. Well, you can absolutely grow violets. You can grow several varieties of violets. You can grow nasturtiums. You can grow lots of different edible and medicinal flowers without a doubt. And this would be, you know, if I was going to write down my list of like top five, yeah, this is one I'd grab. without a doubt. I don't have to because I grow wild all around me. I can walk out into the woods on any given day, say March through December, and I'm going to find violets. Yeah, I mean, it's just like so common around here. And I'm not talking African violet. You know, that really does need to be pointed out. There's a plant called African violet, which is a popular house plant. It has sort of furry... leaves, absolutely different flower, no medicinal value to that plant so far as I know, and it's actually toxic. It's actually poisonous. So we're talking the common wildflower that can be domesticated and has, in the case of pansies or giant jump-ups or heartseeds or whatever you want to call them. So violets are also mentioned in the earliest recorded information on herbs. Homer mentions violets as being used in ancient Greece to moderate anger. To moderate anger. Isn't that interesting? Theophrastus mentions violets as the herb of Zeus and discusses its use in ceremonial garlands. Pliny the Elder gives 17 remedies derived from violet. Pliny was quite the prolific writer. Gosh, I mean... He was said to have slaves that did the writing and they would kind of like go in turns because they would like literally write until their hands cramped up and became even paralyzed. And some of his herbal remedies are for paralysis of the hand from writing because he would just talk and talk and talk and talk and talk. And his slaves had to write everything he said. So anyway, in his work, oh gosh, what was Pliny's work? You'll have to look it up. Pliny the Elder, P-L-I-N-Y. He wrote on natural history. He wrote on herbal medicine. He wrote on cooking. He wrote on warfare. He wrote on medicine. He wrote on, I mean, his goal was to write an encyclopedia of all the knowledge of Rome at that time. And boy, if he didn't do it, he came darn close. But anyway, he said, um, They're both wild and cultivated violets. So 3,000 years ago, people had cultivated violets. He said the purple violet is of a cooling nature for inflammations. They are applied to the stomach and in burning heats. And for pains of the head, they're applied to the forehead. Forehead, forehead, you know, what's right above your eyebrows. I'm told I mispronounced that word. I never have actually heard the difference. violets in particular are used for deflections of the eyes, prolapsus of the fundament in uterus, and separations. Worn in chaplets upon the head or even smelt at, they dispel the fumes of wine and headache, and taken in water, they are a cure for quinzy. The purple violet taken in water is a remedy for epilepsy in children particularly. Violet seed is good for the sting of scorpions. On the other hand, The flower of the white violet opens separations and the plant itself disperses them, while both the white and yellow violet check the menstrual discharge and act as diuretics. When freshly gathered, they have less virtue, and hence it is that they are mostly used dry after being kept a year. You know, you can keep them dried, keep them in a cool, dark place. I don't really see the need to dry them. just in case you need them and you don't have them fresh is the only reason I would. The yellow violet taken in doses of half a cyanthus, no idea, and three aeathri, I don't know what an aeathri is either, of water promotes the ketamina, the roots of it applied with vinegar or suage, affections of the spleen and also the gout. Mixed with myrrh and saffron, they are good for inflammation of the eyes. The leaves applied with honey cleanse ulcerous sores of the head and combined with rarate, another one I don't know, rarate, they are good for the chaps of the fundament and other moist parts of the body. In other words, it's essentially the perineum, but anyway. Employed with vinegar, they affect the cure of abscesses. Now, Dioscorides wrote a few hundred years later, and by that time, yeah, Pliny was Roman, I think. I can't remember who's Roman or Greek right now, but it doesn't matter. They called it, in Dioscorides' time, Ion, I-O-N, a very old word, very old name, actually. He says, it is cooling so that the leaves... Applied by themselves or with polenta, this was actually just ground up wheat or barley mixed with water, not cornmeal as we call it today. They help a burning stomach, inflammation of the eyes, and prolapse of the perineum. A decoction of the purple part of the flower taken as a drink with water helps the synec, I have no idea, an abscess throat. That's what it is, an abscess throat. And epilepsy in children is also called, and we don't even know that, Okay, so violet was much used in a monastic medicine in the Middle Ages, not modern, actually. Most herbalists don't even know about violet these days, which is ridiculous, actually. But it was not included in the officina, probably because it grew too commonly in the wild to require cultivation in the physic gardens. Those were the gardens where monks and nuns sourced their herbs. So, I mean, it was just growing everywhere by the roadsides and meadows and everything. Uh, St. Hildegard recommended violets infused in oil applied to the eyelids before sleeping for foggy eyes. She recommended violets infused in wine for melancholy and aching lungs for a heavy head or kidneys, likely a dull ache. She recommends violets infused in fat as a salt. Violets contain salicin, which is the origin of aspirin would help with backache or kidney pains, I guess. Um, So Father Nape wrote of Violet about 1880, 1890. He said, This pretty little fragrant spring flower shall fill our apotheca also with salutary perfume. When in the beginning of springtime the children get bad coughs in consequence of the frequent changes of weather, the anxious mother boils a handful of green or dried violet leaves in a half a pint of water. and gives the children two or three spoonfuls of such tea every two or three hours. The roots of the plant may be used too, but they must be crushed before boiling. Adults are cured of whooping cough by taking a cup of this tea three times a day. Likewise, it relieves the cough of consumptive people and assists in the loosening of phlegm. It serves as a medicine and should be taken as such. Tea serves further against headache and great heat in the head. And, you know, the salicin, again, good for... for fevers. A piece of linen is moistened with violet leaf tea and bound across the forehead. For a better seal, the head, especially the back of the head, is washed with such decoction. For a swollen throat, the tea is gargled. At the same time, the throat bandage may be applied, dipped in the decoction instead of pure water. Those who suffer from difficulty in breathing, which, however, is the result of gathered gases or morbid matter in the stomach and bowels, So if you're having trouble breathing because you're like really bloated, which has happened to me, I tend to eat too much. I should undertake, especially when it comes to barbecue or roasted oysters. I mean, I am literally known to like consume 10 pounds on the spot, you know, or hot dogs. I can slam hot dogs like there's no tomorrow. Oh my gosh, have I done that before? When I was a musician or working in politics or in journalism, And oftentimes the only thing open middle of the night was like a Scotchman gas station. And I would grab a Jolt Cola, a Goody's headache powder, and like three to ten hot dogs. And I would just slam them. I mean, caffeine and processed meats. I lived on them at 100% until I could find a Waffle House and I go and have a proper meal. I will never say one bad thing about Waffle House. Waffle House has the highest place in my heart when it comes to road food, without a doubt. I mean, no, it was either that or you'd get like frozen White Castles, wrap them in foil and pop the hood and stick them on the manifold and cook them that way. I mean, you know, you just lived on tobacco, caffeine, bourbon and processed meats. It was Not the best lifestyle, let's put it that way. But, you know, I love reading like Hunter S. Thompson's Fear and Loathing. You know, it's like, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. Been there. Yep, yep. Oh, man. I mean, you go like four or five days without sleep and you're just like shaky and agitated. And you can get pretty crazy out there on the road. There's no doubt about it. I'm sure many people. listening to this, soldiers, truck drivers, you've been there. You know exactly what I'm talking about. I do not claim to be the road warriors that you are or were, but I sure did have my experiences, without a doubt. Oh, my word, 100%. So anyway, crushed violet leaves as a compound on inflamed tumors have a cooling effect. If boiled in vinegar, they will heal gout. Regarding the fragrance and the lovely blue color of many a little bunch of violets, keep also a little supply of this medicinal herb in your home dispensatory, that it may still breathe its fragrance to those who are sick at a time when the little spring flower has long since faded. And yeah, they are very, they smell good. Brother Aloysius likewise recommended Violet or Sweet Violet. That's Viola odorata. That's actually what he's talking about. Little wood violets around the house where I live don't have a lot of smell. He said good for lung disorders, measles, scarlet fever, smallpox, throat infections, and podagra. Violet's popularity, let me get a sip of water here. I am about to get the hiccups actually. Violet's popularity was by no means confined to Germany or Italy. In Poland, according to Sophie Haderl-Knapp, Violet was included in the head wreath worn by virgins before marriage, which is a very important tradition there. It's one of the most beautiful Polish traditions. You see these just absolutely gorgeous women wearing young women in their teens, early twenties with those, these wreaths on their heads. And you're like, okay, why do I not live here? And then you look at the temperatures in wintertime and you're like, oh, that's why I don't live here. Okay. But if you, if you ever get tempted by Polish food, you're probably going to stay. It is, I mean, pierogies and kielbasa, sauerkraut and, uh, literally some of the very best food on the face of the earth. Polish cooking, Hungarian cooking is very good by the way, but, uh, Ukrainian cooking, I, I, uh, very close relationship with a Ukrainian lady for several years. Um, Polish food is just stellar. I mean, it is just like, it's food for men. It's food for beer and large servings, uh, biga their their their game soup i mean there's nothing i've ever had okay so i can take a leave borscht borscht is good when it's made right uh actually my ukrainian friend made a very good borscht um polish food is just hands down lights out some of the best food on earth i would of course put french food in there okay because you know very much to my taste and heritage um I can't say a lot for English. German food's quite good. Polish food's better than German food. Similar, again, just like Ukrainian, similar, but Polish food is superior, in my opinion. I do love good Chinese food, especially from the Hunan region. Guangdong, that kind of stuff. Thai food, I love Thai food. If I had to name the top five... I would definitely put Oaxaca in there as well. The food from the Oaxaca and down to Yucatan region of Mexico is heads and shoulders, just lights out better than 90% of the food in Mexican or Tex-Mex food. It's just amazing. It's just, you taste it and it's like, okay, this is an entirely different culture. This does not taste like anything else in mexico this does not taste like anything else in south america and i do enjoy argentinian food quite a bit i enjoy uh japanese food korean food um yeah i'm definitely italian who doesn't like italian But there are like five places in this entire world that I would say have the very best cuisine. And Poland's going to be in there. Poland's going to be right up there with Paris. And actually, I would go more for the Normandy. Paris would not be my choice for French food at all, actually. There are like five places that are going to be top. In my book. And Poland and Oaxaca. And... Yeah, Thailand probably. Guangdong. Yeah. Well, okay. I mean, obviously, like I said, Italian food's fantastic. Spanish food's really, really good. But they're just... Some places that are just magic. And the thing about Polish food is it's not like, and the reason I said I wouldn't choose Paris in French cooking, restaurant food is one thing. Restaurant food in any country should be expected to be very good, right? I mean, because you're paying for it. It's the home cooking. It's the grandmother food, as they call it in France, right? La cuisine de grandma. It is, and my French pronunciation is horrible, I know that. It is the grandmother's food that is the top of any food culture. And in Oaxaca, I mean, they've got like stone mortars and pestles, what do they call them? Moquehetes and such and such. The only electric appliance in the entire town would be a blender for making salsa or moles. They do things in Oaxaca that are, golly, I mean, you just look and you wonder where the heck did this culture come from? It's not like anything around it. And Poland, to me, is that in Europe. Polish cuisine is so far advanced that the grandmother food is better than you can buy in any restaurant in the United States. And I would actually bet on that. I would actually say, find me a James Beard award-winning five-star Michelin award-winning restaurant in North America. You know, United States, Canada, put them together. I'll go that far. And find me the average grandmother in Poland and compare the two. And it's not even going to be a competition. It's going to be, and I'm not Polish. I have no bias on this whatsoever. I'm telling you, Polish food is the best food, probably in Europe. I would put it there with like Scandinavia. I mean, they do some amazing pickled things and all their cured, you know, salmon. It's really very good. I would put it higher than Paris, without a doubt. I would put it higher than Rome without even a thought. Roman food is actually quite good. And I'm quite partial to various regions of Italy when it comes to cooking. My family ruled a good bit of Italy for a while. That's the reason there's a fleur-de-lis on the flag of Florence. I mean, Italian cooking is as much a part of my family tradition as French cooking. We literally ruled it for a good bit. One of my ancestors was a prince in Spain. I really do enjoy some good Spanish cooking, without a doubt. And I'm not talking Mexican. I'm not talking South. I'm talking legit Spanish or Portuguese. Oh my gosh. The Portuguese can cook. Um, I think, and I do love German food. I grew up in a lot of German food, a lot of German and Swiss and Austrian food because of the mountains in North Carolina, we have ski slopes and we had so many Germans and Swiss and Austrians. I grew up with them. Um, I, I mean, I, I, When I was like, you know, a child, I could probably speak as much German as I could English at certain points. And the French side of my family is from the Alps, the Alpine region, and Normandy. Huge. I mean, the Normans were really, yeah, that's probably the biggest part of my heritage outside of French is Norman. But if I had to say, What is the very best food in Europe? It's going to be Polish. I mean, 100%. That doesn't mean I wouldn't tuck into Hungarian or German or even a good English, you know, beef Wellington or bubble and squeak or, you know, fish and chips. I mean, you know, love it. Love the stuff. Love it. But yeah, I mean, I could go on for hours on Polish food and I'm not, I have one Polish ancestor, as best I can tell. My aunt did the whole genetic testing thing, and it looks like 400 years ago, one of our royal lines, and I'm descended of about three to five royal lines, did marry someone in Poland. And so I don't think I just inherited all their taste buds. I just think it's fantastic food. I love traditional Ashkenazi Jewish food. Um, I love Jewish deli food. I love, uh, gosh, Indian fry bread at a powwow. I mean, there's very little, I don't really get excited about eating if it's honest, real made from scratch food, but there is something about Polish food. And, um, yeah, I've got, you know, next week, maybe I can remember. I've got a cookbook. Um, you got to get this book. Hold on. You know what? I'm just going to look it up right now. Um, I know I've wandered far astray, and some of you are saying get back to the herbs. You're going to want this book on your shelf. I'm just going from to where I ordered it probably six months ago. Yeah. So this is the classic Polish cookbook. It tells you how to make everything, and, like, half of it is soup. So, I mean, this is legit. Now, I do have phenomenal Polish sausage books. What's his name? Marianski. You know, I have a shelf full of books written by Polish sausage makers. And that's a totally different category. But here we go. Polish Cookery by Maria. No, I can't pronounce this. No, it's not Maria. It's Marja. M-A-R-J-A. Marja. Which for some reason on the cover says Maria. I don't know. But anyway, it's O-C-H-O- R-O-W-I-C-Z. Yeah. Maria Acherozics Montana. Yeah. This book was published, I think, in the 60s. Could have 50s, even. It is the manual. It is to what French cooking is, you know, Escovier. It's to what American cooking is, the joy of cooking. It is phenomenal. You can pick up, I'm looking at eBay right now because it's where I bought it from. The whole chapter on mushrooms, mushroom cooking. I mean, game and fish. Well, I mean, it's just that good. And you can pick one up for $ 3. 99 with free shipping. 320 pages long. It says, Poland's best-selling cookbook adapted for American kitchens, including recipes for mushroom and barley soup, cucumber salad, bigos, cheese, pierogi, almond babka. Yeah, published 1968 in America. I think it was about 10 years older than that. Many things I can absolutely not pronounce here. Hmm. Yeah, well, they mention another book here, Czechoslovakian cookbooks, also very good. That's Jose Brzoza, very, very good. But anyway, so it says here, Poland, like France, is a country where people really know food. One can stop at a wayside inn in the countryside or at a modest restaurant in a working-class neighborhood and be served a meal worth remembering. Good food is a tradition, 100%. which says this is an American adaptation of Universal Music. They're not real big on vowels in Central Europe. Okay, they're real big on the Zs and the Ks and the Ws, but anyway. It says, in Polish cooking, you will find dumplings, pastry, partridge pie, game pate, many variations of the celebrated pierogi, dough pockets, buckwheat cakes, entrees of venison, wild goose, smothered pike, turkey, and Madeira. I mean, I'm telling you, this, like literally, if I had to pick my top five cookbooks, it's going to make it in there too. I mean, it's going right in there with the scoffier and the joy of cooking and you know, a few others. It's just so good. Just so good. Especially for winter, you know, cold country, you want nice hearty meals. So anyway, going back to violence in Russia, Igor Vilevich 7, Russia also has very good food, by the way, in certain areas. And in some areas, it's really, really, really bad from what I've experienced. Not that I've ever been to Russia, but I've known many Russians. I've known a lot of Russians. A lot. Dated a couple. Yeah. I would, could I say that I would definitely recommend dating a Pole. They are wonderful people. A Hungarian is a little more iffy. A Czech is damn right dangerous. And a Russian is like Russian roulette. They are, some of them are wonderful people. And I have known some, The women are, let's just say, unless you are very strong-willed, prepare to be dominated. And if you are very strong-willed, there's a good 75% chance it's not going to work, if not a 90% chance. Golly. Ukrainians, that's iffy. That's iffy. Ukrainian is like a mix between Polish and Russian, mixed heritage there, the Slavic and the, I can't remember the other one. Beautiful, beautiful women. Oh, beautiful. Intelligent, talented, violent, violent. It's an experience, not for the timid, not for the faint of heart. Some of the best times of my life, though, I can tell you that much. But anyway. So Russia said, Igor Vilevich said that in Russia, the viola tricolor, this giant jump up, is called Anuta's Eyes because the petals appear to be the laughing eyes of a happy young lady, which is a very good thing. You definitely don't want to see those eyes turn cold and steely. If you do, you should probably run. You should probably run and go hide in the ditch for a while. Yeah. Yeah, that's not my nature. I am predominantly Irish, and let's just say the Russian temperament and the Irish temperament are an extremely volatile combination. Infusion of the herb is a good remedy for treating acute respiratory diseases like bronchitis and whooping cough. It also tends to reduce inflammation of the trachea, pansy, or violet, Pansy is the common name of a couple of flowers, by the way, so I'm making clear this is violet, is also useful for inflammation of the urinary tract and is a common folk remedy for treating kidney stems. A pansy infusion is an effective remedy for treating inflammations of the gastrointestinal tract and is used in symptoms of dysentery. Russian herbalists also prescribe pansy infusions for treating arteriosclerosis, arthritis, joint inflammation, and especially rheumatism, gout, rickets in children, and is a preventative remedy in people who have suffered heart attacks. Again, that's why it's called heart disease. Dentists prescribe a pansy gargle for inflammations of the mouth from periodontal disease. In folk medicine, pansy tea taken internally for cough, washes and compresses used widely to treat a variety of skin diseases, including itching, eczema, psoriasis, Again, it's the vitamin C, I mean, not the vitamin C, the aspirin, the salicin in it. If you go get a dandruff shampoo from the grocery store, if it's not coal tar based, it's going to have aspirin in it. And it's the same reason. It reduces that inflammation of the tissue. So the Ashkenazi Jews, which were a huge influence on Polish cooking, by the way, Deandra Cohen and Adam Siegel tell us viola mirabilis. That actually means miraculous, daisy, violet, whatever. Whole plant, leaves, and flowers was used for treatment of heart trouble, palpitation, shortness of breath. Viola hirata, entire plant and roots used for heart trouble, shortness of breath. I'm not seeing anything else here. They also used tricolor. They used them all. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. going through different ones. British tradition, there are tons of them. Gerard wrote of 21 varieties of violets. And false violets. Violet is probably one of the three top herbs in the English tradition, and we hardly use it anymore. Good for inflammations, especially the side and lungs, take away hoarseness of the chest, ruggedness of the windpipe and jaw to allay the extreme heat of the kidney and bladder, the fiery heat of burning agues or fevers. I mean, come on, you know, I mean, it's like a panacea in English and I'm just, you know, but we're, we're repeating things now. I'm going to skip ahead, skip ahead. Uh, this is again, it's from my encyclopedia of bitter medicinal herbs. Uh, I'm skipping ahead page after page. Culpeper, um, um, said, let's see, good, especially for headaches, uh, for lack of sleep and a pains of the heart. Um, you know, I'm just going to tell you if I see anything new here. I went on so long about Polish cuisine, we're running out of time. But interesting. He liked to include it with his fried eggs. I like that idea as well. John Kehoe, in the Irish tradition, said decoction of the syrup is good against fevers, inflammation of the liver and lungs, useful for coughs and pleurisy, externally applied, it's good for abscesses and inflammation, and the seed breaks up kidney stones. Let's see, Miss Grieve, 1930s, gives us a lot of history, a lot of lore, a lot of poems, a lot of recipes. It says that, wow, still violets are also and still used in cookery, especially by the French. Very true. Wine made from the flowers of sweet violet was much used by Romans. I need to try that. I have never made a violet wine. I think I would really enjoy it. She often infused it into vinegar, by the way, and used that culinary and medicinally. She does syrup of violets boiled with sugar to make a syrup. Violet flowers have slightly laxative properties, probably why they're so popular in England. Syrup of violets employed as a laxative. Older writers said that it was good for ague, it's fever, epilepsy, inflammation of the eyes, et cetera. Oh, my word. Seeds purgative and diuretic, useful in urinary complaints. She goes on for page after page after page. Used as a cure for cancers of the tongue. Apparently, I mean, well, it would have very anti-inflammatory antioxidant properties, so held in the mouth. I can see why it would reduce the swelling and, you know, could be helpful. I don't have any idea. Um, Hmm. Yeah. Uh, good pains in the side, lubricate the throat. And yes, it was often used by opera singers and such as a throat spray. Wow. Um, and violent ointments for skin conditions. Okay. We'll go to Native American traditions. Uh, Tismal Crow, he's, uh, Muskogee said, um, He recommends violence as an accelerator, meaning that they help other herbs in their actions. Recommend for bladder pain, prolapse bladder, prolapse uterus, boils, carbuncles, pus-filled sores, swollen glands, and as an antiseptic for cold sores, as a medic to induce vomiting and prevent gagging, which apparently does both, for preventing morning sickness, believe it or not. Stomach pains, diarrhea for the heart, if slow and sluggish, and for angina for cancer and cancer pain. pleurisy, bronchitis, cough is an expectorant for varicose veins to increase lactation, for chapped lips in skin lotions, and is a wild edible. So, the Muscogee apparently think very highly of our wild violets. Plants for the Future says, using the treatment of cancer and whooping cough contains salicylic acid, is therefore effective in the treatment of headaches, migraine, insomnia. Whole plant is anti-inflammatory, diaphoretic, diuretic, emollient, expectorant, and laxative. Taken internally in the treatment of bronchitis, respiratory cataracts, congestion, cost, asthma, of the breast, lungs, digestive tract, mouth and throat infections, used fresh or dried, flowers, demulcent, emollient, means softening essentially. You're using the treatment of bilelessness and lung disorders. petals made into syrup and used for the treatment of infantile disorders. Roots are a stronger expectorant. In high doses, they can be a medic and purgative, makes you throw up and have diarrhea, in which case they're gathered in autumn and dried. Seeds, diuretic and purgative, used for the treatment of urinary complaints and good remedy for gravel that's like kidney and bladder stones. Wow. Okay, so... Oddly enough, very little mention of violet in modern herbal texts and such. I just, I love the plant. It really is nice. I agree with the Russians that seeing a violet flower is like a pretty little smile. They just tend to brighten our days. And they're very, very nice and very, very useful. And you can take those flowers and bury them in sugar, let the sugar dry them out. You can put them in desserts. You can do a thousand things with violet. They're just wonderful little plants. All right, y'all. Go eat some pierogies and kielbasa, and I will talk with you tomorrow. The information in this podcast is not intended to diagnose or treat any disease or condition. Nothing I say or write has been evaluated or approved by the FDA. I'm not a doctor. The U.S. Government does not recognize the practice of herbal medicine, and there is no governing body regulating herbalists. Therefore, I'm really just a guy who studies herbs. I'm not offering any advice. I won't even claim that anything I write or say is accurate or true. I can tell you what herbs have been traditionally used for. I can tell you my own experience and if I believe in herbs help me. I cannot nor would I tell you to do the same. If you use an herb anyone recommends, you are treating yourself. You take full responsibility for your health. Humans are individuals and no two are identical. What works for me may not work for you. You may have an allergy, a sensitivity, an underlying condition that no one else even shares and you don't even know about. Be careful with your health. By continuing to listen to my podcast or read my blog, you agree to be responsible for yourself, do your own research, make your own choices, and not to blame me for anything ever.