Friday, 26 June 2026

Selinum vaginatum (Edgew.) C.B.Clarke

Selinum vaginatum (Edgew.) C.B.Clarke

SEL-in-um -- ancient Greek selinon (parsley OR celery) ... compiled from the web
vaj-in-AH-tum or vaj-in-AY-tum -- with a sheath ... Dave's Botanary
commonly known as: bhutkeshi • Dogri: भूतकेसी bhutkesi • Garhwali: नेसरावलो nesrawlo, तग्गर taggar • Hindi: भूतबेरी bhutberi, भूतकेशी bhutkeshi, मुरा mura, नकली जटामान्सी nakli-jatamansi • Kashmiri: भूतकेशी bhootakeshi, पेशवारी peshavari, पुष्वारी pushwari • Kinnauri: मठोसल mathosal • Kumaoni: भूतकेश bhutkesh, मूर moor • Pahari: भूतजटा bhutjata, मठोसल mathosal • Sanskrit: बल्गना balgana, भूतकेशी bhutkeshi, हयग्रीव hayagriva, मुरा mura, मूर्वा murva

known for: dried root, dried fruit
botanical names: Selinum vaginatum (Edgew.) C.B.Clarke ... homotypic synonyms: Cortia vaginata Edgew. ... and more at POWO, retrieved 25 June 2026
Bibliography / etymology / notes
Links listed as references in the notes below, may not remain valid permanently. Portals / websites have a tendency to re-organize / revise their content, leading to change in URLs of pages in their site. Some sites may even close down at their own will. The bits about the languages of India mentioned below are merely some bare facts gathered from the internet; just enough to satisfy curiosity about "where" could the listed names be best prevalent in India. All English transliterated names to be taken sensu amplo.
~~~~~ ENGLISH ~~~~~
written and spoken widely, in most parts of India
bhutkeshi
  • Flowers of India ... (accessed: June 25, 2026)
  • Because this plant is an alpine wildcraft species endemic to India and parts of Pakistan/Nepal, no native English-speaking populations ever lived alongside it to give it a grassroots name. Trying to sell or buy it as "Indian milk parsley" in a local market would just result in blank stares; it is strictly known by the popular vernacular trade name bhutkeshi. The name translates to "ghost's hair" referring to the dense, fibrous, hair-like remnants of old leaves covering the root base. It is frequently utilized in local spiritual rituals to ward off negative energies, hence the "bhut" or ghost prefix. ... compiled from the web.
~~~~~ DOGRI ~~~~~
written in: Devanagari (डोगरी) ... spoken in: Jammu & Kashmir ... spoken by the Dogras
भूतकेसी bhutkesi
  • Sumeet Gairola, Jyotsana Sharma, Yashbir Singh Bedi - A cross-cultural analysis of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh (India) medicinal plant use - Journal of Ethnopharmacology, Volume 155, Issue 2, 2014, Pages 925-986, ISSN 0378-8741 ... (downloaded: Jan 29, 2022)
  • भूतकेसी bhutkesi and भूतकेशी bhootkeshi are orthographic variants. In day-to-day spoken dialects across Jammu, Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, and Uttarakhand, native speakers frequently flatten the श to स ... compiled from the web.
~~~~~ GARHWALI ~~~~~
written in: Devanagari (गढ़वळि) ... spoken in: Uttarakhand
नेसरावलो nesrawlo
तग्गर taggar
~~~~~ HINDI ~~~~~
written in: Devanagari (हिन्दी) ... spoken in: Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Haryana, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand
भूतबेरी bhutberi
भूतकेशी bhutkeshi, मुरा mura
नकली जटामान्सी nakli-jatamansi
  • Niranjan Chandra Shah - On the history, botany, distribution, uses and conservation aspects of Nardostachys jatamansi in India ... (accessed: June 25, 2026)
  • नकली जटामान्सी nakli-jatamansi — Literally meaning "False Jatamansi". In the herbal trade hubs of Dehradun, Rishikesh, and Tanakpur, local forest collectors heavily trade the roots under this direct title because it functions as the absolute primary commercial substitute/adulterant for critically endangered Nardostachys jatamansi. ... compiled from the web.
  • orthographic variant: जटामांसी jatamansi
~~~~~ KASHMIRI ~~~~~
written in: Koshur (Perso-Arabic كٲشُر), Devanagari (कश्मीरी) ... spoken in: Kashmir ... other names for this language: Koshur
भूतकेशी bhootakeshi, पुष्वारी pushwari (or पुशवारी pushwari)
  • The Useful Plants of India (CSIR, Publications & Information Directorate)
  • पुष्वारी pushwari or पुशवारी pushwari — In North Kashmir's high-altitude Kupwara district (specifically within the sub-alpine Machil/Machaal sector), there is a well-known, high-altitude border village and pasture tract named Pushwari (पुष्वारी / पुशवारी). Because Selinum vaginatum thrives extensively in the moist, alpine meadows of this exact geographical pocket, the local herdsmen, collectors, and traders nicknamed the herb after the locality where they gathered it in large quantities. ... compiled from the web.
पेशवारी peshavari
  • Chaudhary A, Arjun, Devi S. An Overview of Selinum vaginatum – A Medicinal Plant Species: Broad Features, Phytochemical Constituents, and Pharmacological Action. Asian Pac. J. Health Sci., 2022;9(2):251-257. ... (accessed: June 25, 2026)
  • The Historic Trade Route: Historically, high-altitude Kashmiri herbs collected along the line of control (near Kupwara and Gurez) were transported through the major trans-Himalayan trading corridors directly to the large, historic wholesale distribution markets of Peshawar (pre-independence India). ... compiled from the web.
  • The Commercial Tag: In historical crude drug markets, raw roots were branded by traders according to their primary market clearing hubs. Roots sourced from the Kashmir-Pakistan borderlands that passed through this trade route were stamped and sold as "Peshavari" (or Peshawari) to denote their specific sub-alpine, highly aromatic quality. ... compiled from the web.
  • The Twin Terms: This is why "Peshavari" is almost always listed as a twin trade name directly alongside "Pushwari" (the actual village where it is picked in Kashmir) in historical CSIR records and the Ayurvedic Pharmacopoeia of India. ... compiled from the web.
~~~~~ KINNAURI ~~~~~
oral language, written in: Devanagari (किन्नौरी) / Tibetan (ཀིནྣཽརཱི) ... spoken in: Kinnaur district of Himachal Pradesh ... many linguistic varieties ... spoken by Kinnaura people
मठोसल mathosal
~~~~~ KUMAONI ~~~~~
written in: Devanagari ... spoken in: Uttarakhand
भूतकेश bhutkesh
  • ICAR - National Bureau of Plant Genetic Resources - "Bhutkesh" Passport information of "Uttarakhand" State - Ministry of Agriculture (Govt. of India) ... (accessed: June 25, 2026)
  • भूतकेश bhutkesh — a regional phonetic truncation dropping the trailing vowel sound of standard Hindi (भूतकेशी). This shift from शी to श reflects an intentional regional accent rather than a typographic error. ... compiled from the web.
मूर moor
~~~~~ PAHARI (or PAHADI) ~~~~~
written in: Devanagari (पहाड़ी), Perso-Arabic (پہاڑی) ... variety of languages, dialects and language groups, spoken in Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Uttarakhand
भूतजटा bhutjata
  • Parveen Kumar Sharma, N. S. Chauhan, Brij Lal, Amjad M. Husaini (India), Jaime A. Teixeira da Silva (Japan), Punam (India) - Conservation of Phyto-diversity of Parvati Valley in Northwestern Himalayas of Himachal Pradesh, India - Medicinal and Aromatic Plant Science and Biotechnology - Volume 4 Special Issue 1 2010, pp 47-63 ... (accessed: June 25, 2026)
  • In wider North Indian botanical databases and classical texts, Bhutjata is a heavily shared moniker: Nardostachys jatamansi [↗], Corydalis govaniana [↗] ... compiled from the web.
मठोसल mathosal
  • Srivastava, Ravi & Dixit, Pooja & Singh, Lav & Verma, Praveen & Saxena, Gauri. (2018). Status of Selinum spp. L. a Himalayan Medicinal Plant in India: A Review of Its Pharmacology, Phytochemistry and Traditional Uses. Current Pharmaceutical Biotechnology. 20. 10.2174/1389201020666181227150829. ... (accessed: June 25, 2026)
  • Historically, some local populations applied Mathosal directly to the sister species Selinum tenuifolium (now considered Ligusticopsis wallichiana). However, because the roots of S. vaginatum and S. tenuifolium are heavily gathered interchangeably as commercial substitutes for Bhutkeshi and utilized together in traditional Dhoop (incense) preparation, मठोसल is widely accepted and documented as a shared vernacular name for both species across the Himachali Pahari language belt. ... compiled from the web.
~~~~~ SANSKRIT ~~~~~
written in: Devanagari (संस्कृतम्) ... used all over India by priests and scholars
बल्गना balgana, भूतकेशी bhutkeshi, हयग्रीव hayagriva, मुरा mura, मूर्वा murva
  • PCIM&H Monograph Database Portal - The Ayurvedic Pharmacopoeia of India (Part I, Vol. VI, 2008), Ministry of Ayush ... (accessed: June 25, 2026)
  • The listed Sanskrit names are ancient; however, legally and officially anchoring them to definitive botanical species is achieved by modern scientists and Ayurvedic scholars with the help of the Ayurvedic Pharmacopoeia of India (API). The Government of India established the Pharmacopoeia Commission for Indian Medicine & Homoeopathy (PCIM&H) under the Ministry of AYUSH to eliminate chaos and prevent dangerous substitutions in commercial manufacturing [↗].
  • बल्गना balgana is an elusive name. It is not found in the standard general-vocabulary lexicons like the Digital Dictionaries of South Asia (DDSA) [↗], Learn Sanskrit [↗], ॥ विकिशब्दकोशः॥ [↗] or even FRLHT & NMPB's Indian Medicinal Plants Database [↗]. The source of "balgana" in literature — Acharya Bhavamishra officially cataloged Selinum vaginatum under the name 'balgana' in the Bhavaprakasha Nighantu [↗].
~~~~~ KNOWN DISTRIBUTION in INDIA ~~~~~
Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Uttarakhand
~~~~~ Created on: 11:34 25-06-2026 ¦ Last updated: 00:29 26-06-2026 (DD-MM-YYYY) ~~~~~
Apiaceae perennial herb "Selinum vaginatum" "Cortia vaginata" bhutkeshi
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Selinum vaginatum (Edgew.) C.B.Clarke

SEL-in-um -- ancient Greek selinon (parsley OR celery) ... compiled from the web vaj-in-AH-tum or vaj-in-AY-tum -- with a sheath .....