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Common Name | Basil |
| | Family | LAMIACEAE or LABIATAE Mint Family |
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| Other Names | Sweet Basil |
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| Constituents |
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 Remedies using Basil
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Essential oil, herb teas, culinary seasoning
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Basil is more than just a culinary herb for herbalists. They use it to improve appetite and gently combat fatigue. Like other herbs in the mint family it is carminative and disinfectant. The fresh picked leaves make a stimulating and refreshing tea. |
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 The oil is a light greenish-yellow and contains linalol, which is also present in bergamot and lavender oils. Basil is a very aromatic plant which has the stimulating properties of mint, but is hotter. Great to burn while working or reading, helps you to concentrate and uplifts your mood. It is restorative, stimulant, and nerve tonic. The various basils have such different scents because the herb has a number of different essential oils which come together in different proportions for various breeds. The strong clove scent of sweet basil comes from eugenol, the same chemical as actual cloves. The citrus scent of lemon basil and lime basil is because they have a higher portion of citral which causes this effect in several plants, including lemon mint, and limonene, which gives actual lemon peel its scent. African blue basil has a strong camphor smell because it has camphor and camphene in higher proportions. Licorice Basil contains anethole, the same chemical that makes anise smell like licorice, and in fact is sometimes called Anise Basil. |
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fatigue *Mental Clarity *Mood Uplfting * |
 Keep Basil in the first aid kit to treat wasp stings and snake bites. | | To remove a wart, rub basil leaves on the nub daily and cover with a bandage | | Diffuse 5 drops of basil in an aroma lamp to lift depression |
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| Mental Clarity, Focus | | [168] Oil of Basil is an excellent, indeed perhaps the best, aromatic nerve tonic. It clears the head, relieves intellectual fatigue, and gives the mind strength and clarity.
(Tisserand, Robert ) | | Bee stings | | [468] Being applied to the place bitten by venomous beasts, or stung by a wasp or hornet, it speedily draws the poison to it
(Culpepper ) | | Culinary | | [1170] Mediterranean and Indochinese cuisines frequently use basil, the former frequently combining it with tomato. One of the most well known uses of basil is as one of the main ingredients in pesto.
| | Warts | | [685] Basil contains many antiviral compounds, which no doubt is why it's a time honored folk remedy for warts.
(Duke, James A, Ph.D. ) | | Insect repellent | | [951] For a quick insect repellent, just rub some crushed basil leaves on your skin, or add the essential oil to a outdoors blend
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The sweet or bush basil is Ocimum basilicum is the one most used as a condiment. Basil is originally native to India and other tropical regions of Asia, having been cultivated there for more than 5,000 years, there are about a hundred and fifty varieties of basil, now found through out the world.
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 This is the herb which all authors are together by the ears about, and rail at one another (like lawyers). Galen and Dioscorides hold it not fitting to be taken inwardly; and Chrysippus rails at it with downright Billingsgate rhetoric; Pliny, and the Arabian physicians, defend it...an herb of Mars, and under the scorpion, and, perhaps therefore called basilican, and it is no marvel if it carry a kind of virulent quality with it. Being applied to the place bitten by venomous beasts, or stung by a wasp or hornet, it speedily draws the poison to it. Every like draws his like. Nicholas Culpeper |
 Basil brings prosperity and happiness when planted in the garden.
In Europe, they place basil in the hands of the dead to ensure a safe journey. In India, they place it in the mouth of the dying to ensure they reach God. The ancient Egyptians and ancient Greeks believed that it would open the gates of heaven for a person passing on. |
Basil Medicinal Uses
