What is Flaxseed?Natural source of ALA,Omega-3 EFAs,lignans,benefits and utility uses...
Article Content:
- .Botanical Identification and info of flaxseed.
- .Origin and Bible literature of Flaxseed.
- .Botanical Description of Flaxseed.
- .Constituents and Phytochemicals of Flaxseed.
- .Natural ALA,Omega-3 source(Omega-3 EFAs).
- .Comparative advantage of omega-3 supply between Flaxseed and deepsea fish oil.
- .Rich source of lignans and the functions of flaxseed lignans.
- .Uses of parts of Linum usitatissimum.
- .Medicinal and Nutritional application,Therapeutics and Pharmacology of flaxseed.
- .Health Benefits Highlights and Tips of Flaxseed.
- .Other uses and actions of Flaxseed.
- .Nutrition Facts of flaxseed: Why Use Flax Seed.
- .Dosage and administration of Flaxseed: How much to take.
- .Traditional Research of flaxseed.
- .Modern Reasearch of Flaxseed.
- .Research Update:Linum usitatissimum L.
Traditional Research of flaxseed.
Pliny writes:
'What department is there to be found of active life in which flax is not employed? And in what production of the Earth are there greater marvels to us than in this? To think that here is a plant which brings Egypt to close proximity to Italy! - so much so, in fact, that Galerius and Balbillus, both of them prefects of Egypt, made the passage to Alexandria from the Straits of Sicily, the one in six days, the other in five! . . . What audacity in man! What criminal perverseness! Thus to sow a thing in the ground for the purpose of catching the winds and tempests; it being not enough for him, forsooth, to be borne upon the waves alone!'
'Bartholomew the mediaeval herbalist, refers to the making of linen from the soaking of Flax in water till it is dried and turned in the sun and then bound in 'praty bundels' and afterwards 'knockyd, beten and brayd and carflyd, rodded and gnodded; ribbyd and heklyd, and at the last sponne'; of the bleaching, and finally of its many uses for making clothing, and for sails, and fish-nets, and thread and ropes, and strings ('for bows'), and measuring lines, and sheets ('to reste in'), and 'sackes and bagges, and purses (to put and to kepe thynges in').
'Of the making of tow 'uneven and full of knobs' used for stuffing into the cracks in ships, and 'for bonds and byndynges and matches for candelles, for it is full drye and taketh sone fyre and brenneth.' 'And so,' he concludes somewhat breathlessly, 'none herbe is so needfull to so many dyurrse uses to mankynde as is the flexe.'
'Darwin studied several species of Linum, and found that some like the primrose had flowers with two forms of stamens and pistil. His object was to test the relative degrees of fertility of the long and short-styled pistils. L. perenne, for instance, is dimorphic:
''Of the flowers on the long-styled plants he found that twelve were fertilized with their own form pollen, but from a different plant. A seed capsule was only set when pollinated from anthers of the same height as the stigmas.'
'So Darwin concluded:
''We have the clearest evidence that the stigmas of each form require for full fertility that pollen from the stamens of a corresponding height, belonging to the opposite form, should be brought to them.' (Forms of Flowers, p. 92.)
'This plant is visited by bees, who perform the function Darwin describes.
'The Flax is a graceful little plant with turquoise blue blossoms, a tall, erect annual, 1 to 2 feet high, the stems usually solitary quite smooth, with alternate, linear, sessile leaves, 3/4 to 1 inch long.
'Many traditions are associated with this useful plant. Flax flowers were believed in the Middle Ages to be a protection against sorcery. The Bohemians have a belief that if seven-year-old children dance among Flax, they will become beautiful, and the whole plant was supposed to be under the protection of the goddess Hulda, who, in Teuton mythology, was held to have first taught mortals the art of growing Flax, of spinning, and of weaving it.
Reference:
1.What is Flaxseed?Natural source of ALA,Omega-3 EFAs,lignans,benefits and utility uses...




