Useful and medicinal properties of the common
Family Linen - Linaceae
The generic name comes from the Celtic lin - thread, as in the stems during their weeding there are numerous threads - bast fibers.
The species definition in Latin means "useful" and is given because of the widespread use of the plant.
Botanical Description. Annual herbaceous plant with a rod, slightly branching root. Stems rounded, erect, up to 100 cm long. Leaves regular, sessile, narrow-lanceolate and oblong, almost linear. The flowers are sky-blue, collected at the top in a friable corymbose inflorescence. They are with the right double perianth. Sepals and petals five. Stamens five, fused at the base of the threads into a short crown-shaped tube. Pistil one with five posts. Fruit is a globular capsule, containing more than 10 seeds, does not open during maturation.
Blossoms in June - August. Fruits ripen in August - September.
There are two cultural varieties - flax-flax and flax-curls. At the first simple stem with branched apex, with thickened sowings the stems extend upwards and the fibers become long. In flax-curls, a branchy stem, 140-150 flowers, which means that the fruit is much larger than that of flax fiber, but the stems are not suitable for fiber;it is grown for the sake of seeds. Seeds of these two species are equivalent.
Geographical spread. Flax is an old cultivated plant whose homeland is unknown. It was grown to produce fiber for 4-5 thousand years BC in Mesopotamia, Assyria and Egypt. The ancient Egyptians wrapped the mummies initially in woolen, and later in linen cloths. From linen fabrics they sewed clothes.
In our country, flax is cultivated in state farms and collective farms in the north-western regions, especially in the Baltic, Byelorussia, Smolensk, Pskov, Novgorod regions. This plant is lovingly called "northern silk", and various products of linen cloth are loved and valued not only here, but also abroad.
Collection and drying. Ripened flax is plucked from the ground with roots, which increases the length of the fiber. This is done by special flax harvesters. After drying on the field, the tips are threshed, the seeds obtained are cleaned.
Medicinal raw materials. Flaxseed( Semen Lini) consists of egg-like seeds 3-5 mm in length, brownish-yellow in color. The surface is shiny, smooth.
Odor is not present, the taste is mucus-oily.
Chemical composition. Flax seeds contain up to 12% mucus on the surface in epidermal cells, and in cotyledons - 30-48% fatty oil, which contains 35-45% linoleic acid glycerides, 25-35% linoleic, 15-20% oleic acids and a small amount of glyceridespalmitic and stearic acids. Unsaturated fatty acids( linolenic and linoleic, as well as arachidonic, which occurs only in animal tissues) are now conditionally combined into a group called "vitamin F".It has now been established that unsaturated fatty acids are the source of the formation in the body of biologically active substances - prostaglandins( PG).They are given great importance in the regulation of various physiological functions and in the maintenance of homeostasis.
Action and application. Whole flaxseed with water is drunk with constipation. Swelling in the gastrointestinal tract, it mechanically irritates the receptors of the intestinal wall, thereby increasing peristalsis.
Flaxseed oil is used in dietary nutrition, especially in atherosclerosis, because it is a donor of unsaturated fatty acids that go to the synthesis of PG.It is the basis of the drug linetol. It is used to make green soap Sapo viridis, which is part of some ointments, for example Wilson's ointment. Slime from flaxseed is used in everyday life as a hair fixer. Vitamin F, obtained from flax seeds, is a part of cosmetic face creams.
So justifies the species definition of flax, given by K. Linnaeus, - the most useful.