Jatamansi

TRADITIONAL VIEW, WITH SAFETY LIMITS

Hindi name: Balchhad

What the texts say Jatamansi does

• Medhya — supports intellect and memory
• Nidrajanana — induces sleep
• Balya — strengthening
• Varnya — improves complexion
• Kanthya — good for the throat and voice
• Jwaraghna — used in fever

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

Side effects and limits

• Drowsiness
• Digestive upset

Avoid or ask first: Pregnancy.

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

AS THE CLASSICAL TEXTS AND THE API PRESCRIBE

CITES Appendix II — legality of the source matters as much as the matra.

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

Nardostachys jatamansi is critically endangered and Selinum species are sold in its place. The volatile oil profile distinguishes them.

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.

Tikta, kashaya and madhura with sheeta virya and katu vipaka. The sheeta virya is what the texts rely on for its action on the mind.

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.

Jata means matted hair, as an ascetic wears it, and mansi means flesh: the rhizome looks like a matted lock. Tapasvini, the ascetic woman, says the same thing again. The name is a complete identification key.

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.

Selinum vaginatum and Valeriana jatamansi are both sold as jatamansi — the second confusingly carries the same species epithet while belonging to a different genus, and is properly Tagara, a separate dravya. Because jatamansi is scarce and costly, adulteration is routine, and a sample without the characteristic mat of brown fibres is not this plant.

Matched live against the GBIF backbone on 28 September 2026 at 99 per cent confidence. This is the spikenard of the ancient world, traded west from the Himalaya for millennia. It is on CITES Appendix II, which is set out in the safety section.

A WAY TO REMEMBER IT

Nardostachys is nardos (spikenard) + stachys (a spike). Jatamansi is the Sanskrit name kept whole — jata, matted hair, which is exactly what the rhizome's fibre looks like.

Jatamansi is described in the Bhavaprakasha Nighantu and is recorded in the classical literature as medhya. That is what the tradition holds and where it is written down, not a finding about what the rhizome does in a body.

Constituents. The rhizome carries sesquiterpenes including jatamansone and nardostachone, and an essential oil that gives it its distinctive heavy scent.

• 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.