Digital Garden

Cinnamomum camphora (L.) Presl

കർപ്പൂരം

Family : LAURACEAE

Synonym : Laurus camphora L.

Common Names : Chudakarppuram, Ghanarasam, Himasu, Himavaluka, Karpuramaram, Karpuram, Sitamsu, Camphor tree, Camphor Laurel

Flowering Period : Not specified

Distribution : Native of Japan; widely cultivated

Habitat : Cultivated

Uses : Young shoots and leaves edible - cooked. Some caution is suggested because there is a report that the plant is poisonous in large quantities.. The old leaves are dried and used as a spice. An essential oil obtained from the plant is used as a food flavouring in baked goods, candy etc. Camphor has a long history of herbal use in the Orient with a wide range of uses. It has occasionally been used internally in the treatment of hysteria, but in modern day herbalism it is mainly used as the essential oil and internal use is not advised. The wood and leaves are analgesic, antispasmodic, odontalgic, rubefacient, stimulant. An infusion is used as an inhalant in the treatment of colds and diseases of the lungs. The essential oil is anthelmintic, antirheumatic, antispasmodic, cardiotonic, carminative, diaphoretic, sedative and tonic. The essential oil is used in aromatherapy. . The use of the tree as a source of leaf oil has expanded in recent years, and it is now an important source of natural linalool (which is still preferred over the synthetic form for some fragrant applications).

Key Characters :

Trees large; branchlets slender, glabrous; terminal buds large, perulate, the outer bud scales glabrous, the inner sericeous. Leaves spirally arranged, glabrous, chartaceous to sub-coriaceous, ovate-elliptic to elliptic to subovate-elliptic, 1-5 x 3-10 cm, base acute or tapered-cuneate, both surfaces minutely reticulate or above smooth; main nerves slender. Petiole slender, 2-4 cm long. Panicles axillary, slender, glabrous, many-flowered, up to 10 cm long with few short branches. Pedicels 1-2 mm, obconical. Tepals ovate, acutish, fleshy, c. 2 mm. Stamens 1.5 mm long; anthers broad; inner anthers truncate, upper cells smaller, latrorse; gland large attached to the basal part of the filament. Staminodes stipitate. Style as long as the ovary with peltate triquetrous stigma. Fruit globose, slightly fleshy, 5-10 mm in diameter, seated on a shallow, thin cup, 3-5 mm in diameter at the apex, 1-2 mm deep, the basal part fleshy, obconical, usually not differentiated from the obconical pedicel, together 5-7 mm long.