Found in the Hermetikon archive

Flax / Linseed

Linum usitatissimum

Flax / Linseed appears in Hermetikon as an archive-backed plant entry, with references across historical medical, magical, symbolic, and ritual contexts where the source texts support them.

Risk: moderate
Books: 82
Contexts: 2
Mentions: 597

Overview Reading Contexts Citations Related Books

Archive Profile

Identity, safety, and search aliases used to connect this herb to the archive.

Herb identity

Common name: flax
Latin name: Linum usitatissimum(candidate)
Identity note: Historical sources may discuss seed, oil, linen, or ritual use.

Safety

moderate

Flaxseed may interact with medicines and differs from linseed oil and fiber uses.

Historical archive citations are not medical advice. Use modern clinical and poison-control sources for ingestion, dosage, pregnancy, and toxicity questions.

NCCIH Herbs at a Glance: Flaxseed may interact with medicines and differs from linseed oil and fiber uses.

Aliases

flaxlinseedlinseed oilLinum usitatissimum

Flax / Linseed in Historical Sources

Curated archive synthesis of recurring uses, recipes, rituals, and interpretive problems.

Hermetikon's curated reading of Flax / Linseed (Linum usitatissimum) is built from 3 source-linked archive notes and 2 preparation or ritual-use entries. The strongest recurring contexts are preparations and folk magic. Each note below links back to the archive source used for the claim.

Preparation

high

King's gives lime liniment, or Carron oil, as a preparation made from equal volumes of lime-water and linseed oil for application to recent burns.

King's American Dispensatory | Harvey Wickes Felter | 1854

Page 251

Folk magic

high

Frazer records branches from the Grass King's green casing being stuck into flax fields so the flax would grow tall.

The Golden Bough | James George Frazer | 1906

CHAPTER X RELICS OF TREE-WORSHIP IN MODERN EUROPE

Folk magic

high

Frazer's need-fire material also has charred embers planted in flax fields to keep vermin away, tying flax to protective field magic.

The Golden Bough | James George Frazer | 1890

8. The Need-fire

Preparations and ritual uses

Lime liniment with linseed oil

high

King's lime liniment mixes lime-water and linseed oil into a calcareous soap preparation, also called Carron oil.

King's American Dispensatory | Harvey Wickes Felter | 1854

Page 251

Protective flax-field embers

high

Frazer records planting need-fire embers in flax fields to keep vermin from the crop.

The Golden Bough | James George Frazer | 1890

8. The Need-fire

Flax / Linseed Archive Contexts

Compact source patterns from the extracted citation set.

Astrology

11 passages across 11 books; strongest source: Encyclopaedia of Occultism.

Matched as flax; high confidence.

Preparation

4 passages across 4 books; strongest source: Culpeper's Complete Herbal.

Matched as flax; high confidence.

Flax / Linseed Cited Excerpts

Representative public passages with the herb mention highlighted and linked to archive source material.

5 shown

Culpeper's Complete Herbal

Nicholas Culpeper

1653

"...Smallage, Centaury the less, Cetrach, Germander, Chamepitys, Samphire, Fox-glove, Epithimum, Ash-tree, Bay leaves, Toad-flax, Hops, Horehound, Parsley, Poley, Mountain Sage, Scordium, Senna, Mother of Time, Tamarisk, Wormwood, Water-cresses, Hartâ€™s-tongue. *Heat the reins and bladder.* Agrimony, Maudlin, Marsh-mallows, Pimpernel male and female, Brooklime, Costmary, Bettony, Chervil, Germander, Chamomel, Samphire, Broom, Rupture-wort, Clary, Schenanth, Bay-leaves, Toad-flax, Hops, Melilot, Water-cresses, Origanum, Pennyroyal, Scordium, Vervain, Mother of T..."

A CATALOGUE OF SIMPLES IN THE NEW DISPENSATORY.Open in Reader

Preparationalias: flaxhigh confidence

King's American Dispensatory

Harvey Wickes Felter

1854

"...women (.1. King). LINIMENTUM CALCIS (U. S. P. i— LIME LINIMENT. SyNoNVM : I'xrriiH ml. Preparation— "Solution ol" lime, linseed oil, of each, 1 volume. Mix them In- agitation"— (T. S. P.). Or. take of olive oil, or linseed oil, and lime-water, equal parts. Mix and agitate them together i Ed. — Land.). The lime and oil unite and form a calcareous soap, the oleate of calcium, with some glycerin. It is called Carron oil. Turpentine may be sometimes advantageously added to it. Action and Medical Uses. — This is a very useful and probably the best application to rec..."

Page 251Open in Reader

Preparationalias: linseedhigh confidence

The Family Herbal

John Hill

1755

"...se, without spoiling the taste of the medicine. Several of the purging plants also do very well in infusion, as purging flax, and the like; and the fresh root of polypody alone is a very good one: a little lemon juice added to the last named infusion does no harm; and it takes off what is disagreeable in the taste, in the same manner as it does from an infusion of sena. Thus we see what a great number of purposes may be answered by infusions, and they are the most familiar of all preparations. Nothing is required, but pouring some boiling water upon the plan..."

Page 32Open in Reader

Preparationalias: flaxhigh confidence

The Golden Bough

James George Frazer

1906

"... the Grass King was stripped of his green casing; the crown was handed to the Mayor, and the branches were stuck in the flax fields in order to make the flax grow tall. [316] In this last trait the fertilising influence ascribed to the representative of the tree-spirit comes out clearly. In the neighbourhood of Pilsen (Bohemia) a conical hut of green branches, without any door, is erected at Whitsuntide in the midst of the village. To this hut rides a troop of village lads with a king at their head. He wears a sword at his side and a sugar-loaf hat of rushes..."

CHAPTER X RELICS OF TREE-WORSHIP IN MODERN EUROPEOpen in Reader

Astrologyalias: flaxhigh confidence

The Golden Bough

James George Frazer

1890

"... before it reaches the ground. The charred embers of the burned â€œwitchâ€ and discs are taken home and planted in the flax-fields the same night, in the belief that they will keep vermin from the fields. In the RhÃ¶n Mountains, situated on the borders of Hesse and Bavaria, the people used to march to the top of a hill or eminence on the first Sunday in Lent. Children and lads carried torches, brooms daubed with tar, and poles swathed in straw. A wheel, wrapt in combustibles, was kindled and rolled down the hill; and the young people rushed about the fields..."

8. The Need-fireOpen in Reader

Astrologyalias: flaxhigh confidence

Books Mentioning Flax / Linseed

Complete public source inventory, placed after the interpretive reading so the page opens with the most useful synthesis first.

82 books

King's American Dispensatory

Harvey Wickes Felter | 1854

linseedlinseed oilflax

91 mentionscited

Culpeper's Complete Herbal

Nicholas Culpeper | 1653

flaxlinseed

52 mentionscited

The Golden Bough

James George Frazer | 1890

Archive Profile

Herb identity

Safety

Aliases

Flax / Linseed in Historical Sources

Preparation

Folk magic

Folk magic

Preparations and ritual uses

Lime liniment with linseed oil

Protective flax-field embers

Flax / Linseed Archive Contexts

Astrology

Preparation

Flax / Linseed Cited Excerpts

Culpeper's Complete Herbal

King's American Dispensatory

The Family Herbal

The Golden Bough

The Golden Bough

Related Archive Material

Related herbs

Books Mentioning Flax / Linseed