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Reference

Compendium

Ingredients for spellwork: their formal and folk names, categories, deities and forms, with the sources behind them.

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    313 ingredients

    313 ingredients

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    Botanical Name
    Juglans nigra

    Black Walnut

    Black walnut is a deciduous tree of the walnut family, native to the middle and east of North America, where it grows mostly beside rivers and streams; it reached Europe, probably in 1629. It can grow thirty to forty metres tall, with grey-black bark cut into ridges that make a diamond pattern and long pinnate leaves of fifteen to twenty-three leaflets. Its round fruit is a hard, ridged brown nut inside a semi-fleshy husk, which Kynes describes as yellow-green, and the leaves, twigs and husks all have a sharp, spicy smell. The kernels are eaten for their strong flavour, though the thick shell makes them hard to get out, and the dark, straight-grained heartwood is prized for furniture, gunstocks and coffins. The husks hold juglone, plumbagin and tannin, which stain pavements, patios and the fingers of whoever shells the nuts, and early American settlers dyed hair with their brownish-black colour. The tree has long been said to poison nearby plants such as apples, tomatoes, pines and birches with the juglone it releases, although research since 2019 has questioned how far that holds. As a herb, the hull and the leaf are the parts used. Kynes describes it within her Walnut entry, beside the English walnut.

    Caution

    AHPA safety class 2d: not for long-term use. Juice from the fresh hulls can stain the skin yellow or brown for a time, and the juglone in it is a strong skin irritant that may itch or burn; one case of contact dermatitis followed picking black walnuts. Safety in pregnancy and while nursing has not been established. Horses kept on bedding of black walnut sawdust or shavings can develop laminitis.

    The Leaf form carries its own caution; the ingredient's page shows it.

    Forms

    • Leaf
    • Nut

    Folk Names

    • American Black Walnut
    • Eastern American Black Walnut
    • Eastern Black Walnut
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