Gokshura

TRADITIONAL VIEW, WITH SAFETY LIMITS

Hindi name: Gokhru

What the texts say Gokshura does

• Mutrala — diuretic
• Vrishya — aphrodisiac, supports reproductive vigour
• Balya — strengthening
• Rasayana — rejuvenative
• Ashmarihara — used in urinary stones
• Vatahara — pacifies vata

What the evidence says. Traditional use is extensive and long recorded. Modern clinical evidence is limited.

Side effects and limits

• Digestive upset
• Disturbed sleep

Avoid or ask first: Existing kidney or liver disease — caution is advised in light of the reported cases above.

A traditional classification, not a recommendation. The full safety record is below.

AS THE CLASSICAL TEXTS AND THE API PRESCRIBE

Dugdha is the classical anupana in mutrakrichra and as vrishya.

Reported from Sharangadhara Samhita and the Ayurvedic Pharmacopoeia of India. Laisha states what the texts prescribe; it does not recommend. No quantity here is adjusted for a particular person — not for agni, koshtha, bala, age, pregnancy, kidney or liver function, or anything already being taken.

Ayurvedic Pharmacopoeia of India, Part I

Tribulus terrestris fruit. Material from different regions differs several-fold in saponin content, which is why origin is asked for.

These are the marker and the identity test for this dravya, and they are not a test Laisha has run on anything. Laisha does not state the numeric limits here: the assay, ash and extractive figures must be read from the current edition of the Ayurvedic Pharmacopoeia of India, because a wrong limit printed here is a number a laboratory would act on. The entries in this library that DO carry figures carry them because each one was checked.

A single rasa, madhura, with sheeta virya and madhura vipaka — the combination the texts associate with its action on the urinary passage and on vata.

These are the actions the classical texts record. They are statements about what the tradition holds, and this library does not restate them as findings about a human body.

Gokshura means cow's hoof and Trikantaka means three-thorned: both name the spiny fruit, which is how the plant is identified and which is also why it is called puncture vine in English.

Rasa, guna, virya, vipaka and karma are recorded as the classical texts give them, with the text and section named so a student can open the book and check. Where an exact chapter and verse could not be confirmed, this library names the section rather than inventing a number.

Pedalium murex is sold as Bada Gokhru, large gokshura, and Tribulus terrestris as Chota Gokhru, small gokshura. They are different families. Both names are in honest commercial use, so asking for gokhru without saying which one gets whatever the seller stocks. The fruit-for-root substitution described above is the other common one and is harder to see once the material is powdered.

Matched live against the GBIF backbone on 28 September 2026 at 99 per cent confidence. One of the ten roots of Dashamoola, where it is counted among the five lesser roots.

A WAY TO REMEMBER IT

Tribulus is the Latin caltrop, the four-spiked iron weapon thrown to lame horses — and the fruit is precisely that shape. Terrestris means of the ground. Go-kshura means cow's hoof, the same fruit described by what it pricks.

Gokshura is described in the Bhavaprakasha Nighantu and is counted among the Laghu Panchamoola. Ayurveda records it as mutrala and as balya. That is what the tradition holds and where it is written down, not a finding about what the plant does in a body.

Constituents. The fruit and herb carry steroidal saponins, of which protodioscin is the one commercial extracts are standardised to. Content varies markedly with the region the plant grew in, which is a documented and unusually large variation for this species.

• This is a study and clinical reference for practitioners and students. The matra and anupana it records are what the classical texts and the Ayurvedic Pharmacopoeia of India PRESCRIBE — Laisha reports them, it does not recommend them. They are not a prescription for any particular person, and they are not adjusted for your age, agni, koshtha, bala, pregnancy, kidney or liver function, or anything else you are already taking. Only a qualified practitioner who has examined you can do that.
• Traditional classification is recorded as what the classical texts say, with the text and the place in it named so it can be checked. It is not restated as a finding about a human body.
• Nothing here replaces a qualified Ayurvedic practitioner or a doctor.