Description

Native to Asia, Elfdock, or Horseheal, is a herbaceous perennial belonging to the Inula genus, which is part of the aster (or Asteraceae) family. Famous for its therapeutic and medicinal properties, this plant, also called elecampane, was regularly prescribed on a therapeutic basis by Hippocrates (460 to 370 BC). In the Middle Ages, it was a standard plant in the healing herb gardens of monasteries. This is a robust and rather splendid introduced wild flower with large, wrinkled, basal leaves, bearing in summer large, distinctive, bright yellow flowers up to 3ins or more across and described in an old herbal as very beautiful. Long cultivated for its many medicinal virtues, the roots have been candied and sold as sweetmeats and, it is said, the leaves have been used as a pot-herb. 5ft (1.5m).