Mugwort

Mugwort 

(Artemisia vulgaris), a perennial herbaceous plant of the family Compositae. The usually dark red-brown stems are 30–200 cm tall. The twice- or thrice-pinnatisect leaves are 3–15 cm long and 2.5–20 cm wide; they are broadly ovate or elliptical, white-tomentose beneath, with small auricles at the base. The lower leaves are on petioles; the upper ones are sessile and smaller than the upper ones. The obovate or elliptical heads measure 2–3 mm across and are gathered into a dense panicle. All the flowers are tubular and reddish. The marginal flowers are pistillate, and the middle ones are bisexual. The mugwort is found in forests and steppes in Europe and Western Asia. It grows as a weed along roads and river banks, in wastelands and dumps, amid shrubbery, and—less commonly—in forest glades and margins. In the USSR the plant occurs in the European portion, the Caucasus, Western Siberia, and Middle Asia. Mugwort contains an essential oil, carotene, and ascorbic acid; the apices of the flowering plants and roots are used in folk medicine.