Word: lithospermum
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...India, Dr. Sudhir Nath Sanyal thought he had found just what the subcontinent needs in an extract from the common pea, Pisum sativum, but his results have not been confirmed. Some Europeans and the American Shoshone Indians swear by an extract from a species of gromwell or stoneseed (Lithospermum), but scientists have not been able to find the magic in it-if there...
...Indians have known for ages is discouraging enough in itself, but why don't these myopic researchers take a course in simple Latin and discover what the old Roman botanical titles of these herbs meant in the first place? Even a schoolboy can tell at a glance that Lithospermum officinale means "seed petrified in the laboratory" . . . Gromwell indeed...
...interesting to note in connection with your article on the herb, gromwell, that the scientific name Lithospermum officinale may well be translated "stone sperm." This would indicate that the taxonomist who tacked the name to the species was aware of its fertility-inhibiting properties...
...Bryant Conant of Harvard, science will have found a safe contraceptive that can be taken by mouth and the world will have a remedy for overpopulation. Last week British researchers reported an early lead in that direction. They had made an extract from a common countryside herb called gromwell (Lithospermum officinale) and given it first to female rats. The rats stopped ovulating. When the gromwell was stopped, they promptly resumed ovulating and proved, by becoming pregnant, that their fertility had been only temporarily arrested...
...swallow of gromwell (or any of a dozen other chemicals on which scientists are working) does not make a contraceptive summer. But the case for gromwell has a bit of legendary support: Shoshone Indians have long insisted that an extract from the western species (Lithospermum ruder ale) helps them to control the size of their families...
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