Spanish-English

Spanish-English Medicinal Plant Names for Southwest United States and Mexico
(Emphasis on Plants of New Mexico, U.S.A. & Morelos, Mexico)
with some revisions as 12/12/2007 by Paul McKee

The Tree of Life Perspective (Plant Genealogy)
Summary; Medicinal genus; Synonyms; Example; Organization; Medicinal uses; Appendix

This dictionary mostly includes medicinal plant names, where a given common name is linked to all the scientific names that were found to apply to it, while a given scientific name is linked to all common names that were found to apply to it. Whether a common or scientific name of a plant or a name of a natural medicinal oil, extract, clay, animal part, etc., each entry is in alphabetical order according to the first word in its paragraph. The same applies to the name of some compound situation (as a name for a formula of several plants or other materials) that may require one or more short definitions. When BONAP is cited, following a scientific name, it can be assumed that the plant involved grows in North America north of Mexico. If a scientific name applies to a plant that grows in New Mexico, this will be indicated by "In New Mexico" preceding the family name. When the scientific name is followed by (?), this indicates that the name is not listed in BONAP or it has not yet been found in any other regional check-list of up-to-date plant scientific names. References are cited as abbreviations or key words that indiciate geographical region, ethnic group, or language (e.g., BONAP, Index New Mexico, Upper Rio Grande Valley, Maya, Mexican-American, and Nahuatl). For common names, only Aztec (Nahuatl), English, Mayan, and Spanish names are included (as they are applied in Southwest United States and Mexico). In this dictionary, there is an emphasis on plant names of New Mexico, U.S.A. & Morelos, Mexico. Plant names from the state of Arizona, as well as the entire southwestern United States, may eventually be added. Although medicinal plant names from Morelos, Mexico are also emphasized, names of potential medical interest from any part of Mexico will eventually be added.

A medicinal genus is defined here as a group of one or more very closely related species that are found to be medicinal any where in the world. In this group, all member species are distinguished by the second word of their scientific name and have the same first word called the genus name. If a medicinal genus is found in New Mexico, this will be noted, along with some of its local species, subspecies, or varieties; and this will be done even when the local plants are not recorded to be used medicially in the state. The same applies to medicinal species. When such entries occur, the reader will always be informed that the plants involved have likely medicinal properties, but no record of their use in New Mexico has yet been located.

As a starting point, synonyms (alternative scientific names) are usually only included for plants found in New Mexico, according to Biota of North America Program (BONAP) or Roalson and Allred (1995) A Working Index of New Mexico Vascular Plant Names, New Mexico Agr. Exp. Sta. Res. Rep. 702 (Index New Mexico). It is important to emphasize that an up-to-date, authoritive synonomized check-list is a basic necessity for collating or integrating common names with scientific names of plants reported to be used medicinally from diverse and sometimes fragmented sources that are available from the literature. This is especially true if older literature sources are accessed. However, when most taxonomic revisions of a genus, for example, have been regional rather than global, this can contribute to the confusion that has ensured the use of multiple taxonomic (scientific) names to describe the same species. This problem has significantally been resolved for plant scientific names in North America north of Mexico by BONAP. However, somewhat of a problem can arise for some plants further south in Mexico due to lack of a complete, up-to-date, authoritive synonomized check-list for this geographical region. Such synonomized check-lists give an organized listing of the most important scientific name synonyms under each up-to-date preferred scientific name for families, orders, and other lineages, including genera, species, subspecies, and varieties. The need for such a check-list of global scope has been stressed by the Global Strategy for Plant Conservation (UNEP).

The following example includes all entries (common and scientific names)
that apply to the genus Achillea L. (Yarrow) and its species:
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Achillea - L. - (BONAP)
In New Mexico, U.S.A., and Morelos, Mexico - Family Asteraceae - (BONAP)
- Common name - U.S.A. or Mexico:
- Yarrow - (BONAP)

Achillea lanulosa - Nutt. - (BONAP)
(= Achillea millefolium var. occidentalis, the more accepted scientific name)
In New Mexico - Family Asteraceae - (BONAP)
- Common names - U.S.A. or Mexico:
- Milfoil - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
- Nosebleed - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
- Old man - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
- Plumajillo (little feather) - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
- Sneezeweed - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
- Thousand seal - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
- Western yarrow - (U.S.A.)
- Yarrow - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
*Synonym is included here, because it is commonly found in literature.

Achillea millefolium - L. - (BONAP)
In New Mexico - Family Asteraceae - (BONAP)
- Common names - U.S.A. or Mexico:
- Bloodwort - (ITIS, USDA)
- Carpenter's weed - (ITIS, USDA)
- Common yarrow - (ITIS, U.S.A.)
- Hierba de las cortaduras - (ITIS, USDA)
- Milflor - (Mexico)
- Milfoil - (ITIS, European English)
- Millenrama - (Mexico)
- Nosebleed - (European English)
- Pluma de la tierra (feather of the land) - (Aztec)
- Plumajillo (little feather) - (ITIS)
- Staunchgrass - (European English)
- Tlaquequetzal - (Aztec)
- Western yarrow - (ITIS)
- Yarrow - (Mexico)
- Yarrow (common) - (ITIS)
*Distribution: North America. According to ITIS, this species has several infraspecies, including Achillea millefolium var. alpicola, Achillea millefolium var. arenicola, Achillea millefolium var. borealis, Achillea millefolium var. californica, Achillea millefolium var. gigantea, Achillea millefolium var. litoralis, Achillea millefolium var. megacephala, Achillea millefolium var. millefolium, Achillea millefolium var. nigrescens, Achillea millefolium var. occidentalis, Achillea millefolium var. pacifica, and Achillea millefolium var. puberula. They are all probably used in folk medicine of North America. However, only two of these (found in New Mexico) are listed here with their common names and synonyms.

Achillea millefolium var. alpicola - (Rydb.) Garrett - (BONAP)
In New Mexico - Family Asteraceae - (BONAP)
- Common name - U.S.A. or Mexico:
- Common yarrow - (ITIS, BONAP)
- Synonyms - (BONAP):
- Achillea alpicola - (Rydb.) Rydb.
- Achillea fusca - Rydb.
- Achillea lanulosa ssp. alpicola - (Rydb.) Keck
- Achillea lanulosa var. alpicola - Rydb.
- Achillea millefolium var. fusca - (Rydb.) G.N. Jones
- Achillea subalpina - Greene
*Distribution: North America

Achillea millefolium var. occidentalis - DC. - (BONAP)
In New Mexico - Family Asteraceae - (BONAP)
- Common names - U.S.A. or Mexico:
- Common yarrow - (ITIS)
- Milfoil - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
- Nosebleed - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
- Old man - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
- Plumajillo (little feather) - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
- Sneezeweed - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
- Thousand seal - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
- Western yarrow - (ITIS, U.S.A.)
- Yarrow - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)
- Synonyms - (BONAP):
- Achillea angustissima - Rydb.
- Achillea aspleniifolia - auct. non Vent.
- Achillea eradiata - Piper
- Achillea gracilis - Raf.
- Achillea laxiflora - Pollard & Cockerell
- Achillea lanulosa - Nutt.
- Achillea lanulosa var. arachnoidea - Lunell
- Achillea lanulosa var. eradiata - (Piper) M.E. Peck
- Achillea lanulosa ssp. typica - Keck
- Achillea millefolium var. aspleniifolia - (Vent.) Farw.
- Achillea millefolium var. gracilis - Raf. ex DC.
- Achillea millefolium ssp. lanulosa - (Nutt.) Piper
- Achillea millefolium var. lanulosa - (Nutt.) Piper
- Achillea millefolium ssp. occidentalis - (DC.) Hyl.
- Achillea millefolium ssp. pallidotegula - Boivin
- Achillea millefolium var. rosea - (Desf.) Torr. & Gray
- Achillea millefolium var. russeolata - Boivin
- Achillea occidentalis - (DC.) Raf. ex Rydb.
- Achillea rosea - Desf.
- Achillea tomentosa - Pursh, non L.
*Distribution: North America

Bloodwort - Achillea millefolium - (ITIS, USDA)

Carpenter's weed - Achillea millefolium - (ITIS, USDA)

Common yarrow - Achillea millefolium - (ITIS, U.S.A.)
- Achillea millefolium var. alpicola - (ITIS, BONAP)
- Achillea millefolium var. occidentalis - (ITIS)

Hierba de las cortaduras - Achillea millefolium - (ITIS, USDA)

Milflor - Achillea millefolium - (Mexico)

Milfoil (= Plumajillo) - Achillea millefolium - (ITIS, European English)
- Achillea millefolium var. occidentalis - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)

Millenrama - Achillea millefolium - (Mexico)

Old man (= Plumajillo) - Achillea millefolium var. occidentalis - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)

Pluma de la tierra (feather of the land) - Achillea millefolium - (Aztec)

Plumajillo (little feather) - Achillea millefolium - (ITIS)
- Achillea millefolium var. occidentalis (= Achillea lanulosa) - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)

Sneezeweed (= Plumajillo) - Achillea millefolium var. occidentalis - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)

Staunchgrass - Achillea millefolium - (European English)

Thousand seal (= Plumajillo) - Achillea millefolium var. occidentalis - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)

Tlaquequetzal - Achillea millefolium - (Aztec)

Western yarrow - Achillea millefolium - (ITIS)
- Achillea millefolium var. occidentalis - (ITIS, U.S.A.)

Yarrow (= Plumajillo) - Achillea - (BONAP)
- Achillea millefolium - (Mexico)
- Achillea millefolium var. occidentalis - (Upper Rio Grande Valley)

Yarrow (common) - Achillea millefolium - (ITIS)
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The main Spanish/English/scientic names dictionary is supported by links to other pages. These include pages on botany, medicinal properties, and even plant fossils that are not organized by the alphabetical order of any system of names, but (as much as possible) according to the order of branching of lineages. However, there are two glossaries, including subject names and botanical terms useful in identification that are placed in alphabetical order. The information on fossils is provided to help support lineages, genealogical relationships (branching pattern of ancestor-descendant relationships due to evolution), or even locate uncertain evolutionary relationships on the tree of life. An attempt is made to extensively interlink all pages with each other. The pages organized on the basis of genealogical relationships aid the reader in developing a better inderstanding of the distribution medicinal properties in various lineages. An attempt is made here to address all the issues involved in the study of living medicinal remedies by integrating as much as possible the classification and identification (involving what is called systematic biology or botany) with the properties and uses of these natural resources.

The organization of nature does not center arround human beings and their needs. Our uses of living medicinal resources depends on our ability to find an application for properties provided within the framework of the natural order. In this way our uses of living medicinal resources depend and often can even reflect the natural order referred to here as genealogical relationships, which influence and are influenced by relationships between living organisms and the environment. Once it can be recognized that medicinal properties of plants or other organisms tend to be organized in nature according to genealogical relationships of these resources, the more natural genealogical perspective can be used as a complementary but alternative approach to lists of remedies artificially organiized in alphabetical order or on the basis of how they can be employed to treat health conditions pertaining to the systems of the human body. This genealogical approach is necessary in developing a general "birds-eye view" of the medicinal potential of larger and larger numbers of living resources used by people throughout the world. This allows for the possibility of putting a significant percentage of medicinal information together on the basis of major lineages and sublineages of the living resources, which can enable more efficient storage and retrieval of specific information at the same time as providing a broader perspective that can often help the reader remember or keep track of the major properties of a wider diversity of living medicinal resources. On the other hand, this broad perpective can be employed to help the reader narrow down and understand the properties of specific medicinal resources in the regions of interest, namely the Southwest USA, focusing on New Mexico, and the often much more diverse regions of Mexico, focusing on Morelos. The genealogical perspective offered here can even aid the herbalist that wants to adopt only a small collection of highly effective medicinal resources, because such a reader can be selective in excessing the links of these pages that address information on his or her choice medicinal plants to learn how to identify these remedies and distinguish them from others in the same or different lineages. When searching for alternative remedies with similar medicinal properties, such remedies are often concentrated in specific (relatively narrow) lineages; however, due to independent development of similar properties, alternatives can also be found in different lineages. The search for an alternative remedy to one that may not grow in the region of the herbalist can be greatly aided by this genealogical perspective. If a species of interest does not grow in a particular region but other members of the specific lineage of this species can be found, the herbalist can make an attempt to selectively uncover traditional use information for these alternative species. Potential alternative species that grow wild in New Mexico for genera will often be listed in the main Spanish/English/scientic names dictionary. Uncovered traditional use information for any of these species can often aid (as statistical confirmation) in selecting the ones most likely valuable as alternatives. If no members of a specific lineage can be found growing wild in the region, the quest for a local alternative becomes more difficult, but more inclusive lineages or different lineages can be searched for one or more species with the sought-after properties or traditional use patterns. The genealogical perspective can often provide a well-defined frame of reference for such a search. The genealogical perspective also provide the most efficient means for organizing information that can aid in the classification and identication of organisms of medicinal interest. Without this perspective the learning process often becomes the memorization of artifically organized information that is not always easily assimulated. Without any understanding of how to recognize the diagnostic characters that aid in the identification of medicinal resources and how major medicinal properties often can be associated with specific lineages, the reader is left with lists of medicinal resources that he or she cannot easily identify in the wild. Many species in these lists may not even grow wild in the region where the reader resides.

Much could be written about the medicinal uses of plants listed in this dictionary. Although such information on uses is often fascinating, the primary purpose of this dictionary is not the enumeration of all recorded medicinal folk lore but to provide a means for collating medicinal resource names upon the basis of a strong emphasis on plant genealogy. This is the perspective that becomes most useful to accurate plant identification. Without accurate identification, plant names become meaningless. Therefore, much effort has been made here to backup the multitude of plant names with a basic botany resource that can help the reader develop practicle skills in plant identication. One of the more effective ways of doing this in most cases is to become familiar with the diagnostic features of the major lineages of the medicinal plant tree of life. Although the listing of all recorded medicinal folk uses is beyond the scope of this dictionary, some uses will here and there be incorporated in the pages on botany, especially when they help reveal underlying medicinal properties or correlate well with the distribution of pharmacologically active chemicals in families or other plant groups. This is done, because such a distribution of chemicals and their medicinal properties is often closely linked to plant genealogy, and, therefore, can be incorporated (along with other characters of plant form and structure) in classification and identication. Therefore, in this work, there is much effort to characterize the distribution of specific types of chemicals of medical interest in various plant lineages. The reader can find much information on the distribution of tannins, lignans, neolignans, terpenes, phenolics, flavonoids, alkaloids, etc. in the very lineages that he or she is learning to identify. Since resources for plant identification are linked to all the scientific names and the common names are linked to all the scientific names, this dictionary can become much more than a list of names and should be most useful to the practicle herbalist, as well as anyone interested in learning about medicinal plants. In this way, the goals of classification, identication, and the act of uncovering medically interesting and even useful properties in plants can often (as in the traditional healing of the past) become overlapping and mutually supportive processes.

A supportive appendix to this summary includes the following topics:
Ancient uses; Botany and medicine; Dioscorides; Plant characters; Tree of life; Lineages and sister groups; Lineages defined; Phenetics versus cladistics; Comparative ethnopharmacology; Demonstration of comparative ethnopharmacology; Molecular information; Statistical significance; Possible shared knowledge from the remote past; Hypothesis; Database; and Primary and secondary chemicals.

References

Angiosperm Phylogeny Group (2003) Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society, 141, 399�436. Classification for the orders and families of flowering plants. Cited as APG II.

American Botanical Council
http://www.herbalgram.org/youngliving/herbalgram/
Cited as: Herbalgram.

Botanical nomenclature of the Am�ricas:
http://www.fundaciondoctordepando.com/Index.htm
http://www.fundaciondoctordepando.com/GLOSARIOS%20y%20VOCABULARIOS/Nomenclatura%20Bot%E1nica-AAA.htm
Cited as: AAA, BBB, CCC, EEE, etc.

Britton & Brown Illustrated Flora - 2nd Edition (1913) "An Illustrated Flora of the Northern United States and Canada". cited as: northern U.S.A. See Medicinal Plant excerpts from Michael Moore:
http://www.swsbm.com/Britton-Brown/Britton-Brown1.html
http://www.swsbm.com/Britton-Brown/Britton-Brown2.html
http://www.swsbm.com/Britton-Brown/Britton-Brown3.html

L.S.M. Curtin (1965) Healing herbs of the upper Rio Grande cited as: Upper Rio Grande Valley.

Joie Davidow (1999) Infusions of Healing cited as: Maya, Mexican-American, and Nahuatl.

Department of Agriculture Ethnobotany Database (mostly uses of medicinal plants)
http://hpm101.gotadsl.co.uk/perl/ace3/searches/browser/EthnobotDB
http://ukcrop.net/perl/ace/search/EthnobotDB
Cited as EthnobotDB.

Kartesz JT. (1999) A synonymized checklist and atlas with biological attributes for the vascular flora of the United States, Canada, and Greenland; In: Kartesz JT, Meacham CA, Synthesis of the North American Flora, Version 1.0; Chapel Hill: North Carolina Botanical Garden cited as: BONAP or U.S.A.
For plants in United States or Canada, the latin binomial is followed by the author(s) of the scientific name according to BONAP.
For plants in New Mexico, some synonyms (alternative scientific names) are included according to BONAP or Index New Mexico.

The Families of Flowering Plants
L. Watson and M. J. Dallwitz
http://www.biologie.uni-hamburg.de/b-online/delta/angio/
Cited as Delta.

Roalson and Allred (1995) A Working Index of New Mexico Vascular Plant Names, New Mexico Agr. Exp. Sta. Res. Rep. 702.

For plant names in Canada, Mexico, and United States, access Integrated Taxonomic Information System. Cited ITIS.
http://www.cbif.gc.ca/pls/itisca/taxaget?p_ifx=plglt
http://annual.sp2000.org/show_database_details.php?database_name=ITIS

The International Plant Names Index is cited IPNI.
http://www.ipni.org/index.html
http://www.ipni.org/ipni/plantsearch?request_type=search&output_format=query&ret_defaults=on

International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) or World Conservation Union
The latest update is the 2006 Red List, released on 4 May 2006.
IUCN Red List of Threatened Species (also known as the "IUCN Red List" and "Red Data List")
http://www.iucnredlist.org/

Kay, M. A. (1996) Healing with plants in the American and Mexican West cited as: Aztec, Baja California, Baja California Norte, Baja California Sur, Californian Spanish, Colorado Spanish, Mexico Spanish, New Mexico Spanish, Northwestern New Spain, Southwest U.S.A./Northern Mexico or Kay.

Multilingual Multiscript Plant Name Database: MMPND (http://www.plantnames.unimelb.edu.au/Sorting/List_bot.html) is cited as English, MMPND, or Spanish.

Michael Moore's published works cited as: Moore. See also Plant Images by Common English and North American Spanish Name (http://www.swsbm.com/homepage/NameIndex.html).

Native American Ethnobotany Database
Foods, Drugs, Dyes, and Fibers of Native North American Peoples.
Materials provided by Dan Moerman, Professor of Anthropology.
http://www.umd.umich.edu/cgi-bin/herb/
Cited as NAEDB.

Pacific Island Ecosystems at Risk project
Cited as: PIER

Plants For A Future: Database Search is cited as: PFAF, Southwestern N. America/Mexico.

PlantSystematics.org is cited as PSORG.
http://132.236.163.181/index.html

Plantas que curan is a book with some material presented (in web pages) by M�xico desconocido. This is cited as En Nahuatl, M�xico Desconocido.

Mills (1988) The Dictionary of Modern Herbalism, Healing Arts Press.
Cited as European English.

UNEP (2004) Secretariat for the Conservation of Biological Diversity, Conference of Parties, Decision VI/9
Global Strategy for Plant Conservation.
http://www.biodiv.org/decisions/default.asp?dec=VI/9.
Home: http://www.biodiv.org/default.shtml
2006 Catalogue of Life: http://annual.sp2000.org/search.php
The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF): http://www.asia.gbif.net/portal/index.jsp

Uphuf, J. C. Th. (1959) Dictionary of Economic Plants, New York, cited as: Uphuf, 1959

USDA, NRCS. 2006. The PLANTS Database (http://plants.usda.gov, 3 July 2006). National Plant Data Center, Baton Rouge, LA 70874-4490 USA. Cited as USDA.
http://plants.usda.gov/index.html

Vascular Plant Families and Genera
http://www.kew.org/data/genlist.html
Cited as KEW.