Found in the Hermetikon archive

Myrtle

Myrtus communis

Myrtle 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: 70
Contexts: 4
Mentions: 357

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: myrtle
Latin name: Myrtus communis(candidate)
Identity note: Strong Venus, wreath, funeral, and classical plant-lore material.

Safety

moderate

Aromatic oils and medicinal preparations call for caution; ordinary symbolic references are not dosing guidance.

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

Kew POWO: Aromatic oils and medicinal preparations call for caution; ordinary symbolic references are not dosing guidance.

Aliases

myrtlemyrtlesMyrtus communis

Myrtle in Historical Sources

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

Hermetikon's curated reading of Myrtle (Myrtus communis) is built from 3 source-linked archive notes and 1 preparation or ritual-use entry. The strongest recurring contexts are preparations, astrology, and symbolism. Each note below links back to the archive source used for the claim.

Preparation

high

Culpeper places myrtle berries in a compound red-wine and smith's-water preparation with comfrey, ash roots, willow, and St. John's wort, so the archive has concrete medicinal recipe evidence rather than only emblematic myrtle references.

Culpeper's Complete Herbal | Nicholas Culpeper | 1653

Chapter 62

Astrology

high

Agrippa assigns myrtle to the Moon in a planetary list of plant materials, while other occult sources also connect myrtle with Venus; the archive therefore preserves several correspondence traditions rather than a single fixed attribution.

Three Books of Occult Philosophy | Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim | 1533

Page 148

Symbolism

high

Frazer's Roman material treats paired myrtle trees as political and social omens: the Patrician and Plebeian myrtles flourish or decline with the fortunes of their classes.

The Golden Bough | James George Frazer | 1913

Â§ 3. The External Soul in Animals.

Preparations and ritual uses

red-wine compound with myrtle berries

high

Culpeper's formula bruises and boils myrtle berries with comfrey, ash roots, willow leaves, and St. John's wort in red wine and smith's water; this is historical medicinal preparation evidence, not modern dosage guidance.

Culpeper's Complete Herbal | Nicholas Culpeper | 1653

Chapter 62

Myrtle Archive Contexts

Compact source patterns from the extracted citation set.

Medicine

1 passage across 1 book; strongest source: The Family Herbal.

Matched as myrtle; high confidence.

Astrology

5 passages across 5 books; strongest source: A Book of Myths.

Matched as myrtle; high confidence.

Preparation

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

Matched as myrtle; high confidence.

Safety

2 passages across 2 books; strongest source: Bible Myths.

Matched as myrtles; high confidence.

Myrtle 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

"...of Ashtree roots, and their leaves, the roots of Comfrey the greater and smaller with their leaves, of each two ounces, Myrtle Berries an ounce and an half, the leaves of Willow, the tops of St. Johnâ€™s Wort, of each an handful and an half, having bruised them, boil them together in red Wine, and Smithâ€™s Water, of each two pound, till half be consumed, strain it, and add Oil of Myrtles, and Roses omphacine, of each one pound and an half, Goatâ€™s suet eight ounces, boil it again to the consumption of the decoction, strain it again, and add Litharge of Gold ..."

Chapter 62Open in Reader

Preparationalias: myrtlehigh confidence

King's American Dispensatory

Harvey Wickes Felter

1854

"...r fatty acids, distilling over in a curivnt of steam. Sub-yroup B are wax-like and of peculiar composition. (Japan wax, myrtle wax.) VIII. L.\Ki)-oii. Gitoii'.— .-iMiiiia/ olfiiif. Do not dry notably on exposure, and give solid elaidins with nitrous acid. Not turned brown by boiling'with caiistic alkalies (diflerence from marine animal oilsi. Includes neat's-foot oil, bone oil, lard oil. and tallow oil. IX. T.\Li.iiw Guoi-p.— .Vi)/( iiuimal jaln. Predominantly glyceriiles of palmitic and stearic acids, although l>utter contains glycerides of lower aciiis, nota..."

Page 435Open in Reader

Preparationalias: myrtlehigh confidence

Three Books of Occult Philosophy

Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim

1533

"...meg; from Mars, lignum aloes; from the Sun, mastic; from Venus, saffron; from Mercury, cinnamon; and from the Moon, the myrtle. CHAPTER XLV. Of Gollyries, Unctions, Love-Medicines, and their Virtues. Moreover, collyries and unguents, conveying the virtues of things natural and celestial to our spirit, can multiply, transmute, transfigure, and transform it accordingly, as also transpose those virtues which are in them into it; that so, it cannot act only upon its own body, but also upon that which is near it, and affect that by visible rays, charms, and by touc..."

Page 148Open in Reader

Astrologyalias: myrtlehigh confidence

The Family Herbal

John Hill

1755

"...e menses. It is in this latter respect a very valuable medicine, but the use of it must be continued some time. ### The MYRTLE. *Myrtus.* A LITTLE shrub, very beautiful in its manner of growth, a native of Italy, but common in our gardens. The trunk is covered with a rough brown bark. The branches are numerous, slender, tough, and reddish. The leaves are very beautiful; they are small, short, of a fine green, pointed at the ends, not serrated at the edges, and they stand in great numbers, and in a beautiful order upon the branches. The flowers stand on short f..."

Page 282Open in Reader

Medicinealias: myrtlehigh confidence

The Golden Bough

James George Frazer

1913

"...on which nature herself has passed a sentence of death. At Rome in the ancient sanctuary of Quirinus there grew two old myrtle-trees, one named the Patrician and the other the Plebeian. For many years, so long as the patricians were in the ascendant, their myrtle-tree flourished and spread its branches abroad, while the myrtle of the plebeians was shrivelled and shrunken; but from the time of the Marsian war, when the power of the nobles declined, their myrtle in like manner drooped and withered, whereas that of the popular party held up its head and grew stro..."

Â§ 3. The External Soul in Animals.Open in Reader

Astrologyalias: myrtlehigh confidence

Books Mentioning Myrtle

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

70 books

Culpeper's Complete Herbal

Nicholas Culpeper | 1653

myrtlemyrtles

28 mentionscited

King's American Dispensatory

Harvey Wickes Felter | 1854

Archive Profile

Herb identity

Safety

Aliases

Myrtle in Historical Sources

Preparation

Astrology

Symbolism

Preparations and ritual uses

red-wine compound with myrtle berries

Myrtle Archive Contexts

Medicine

Astrology

Preparation

Safety

Myrtle Cited Excerpts

Culpeper's Complete Herbal

King's American Dispensatory

Three Books of Occult Philosophy

The Family Herbal

The Golden Bough

Related Archive Material

Related herbs

Books Mentioning Myrtle