Clematis root, “the immortal of prodigious power”

Wei Ling Xian, the Chinese name for clematis root, is one of the most emphatic in the pharmacopoeia: it reads “the immortal of prodigious power”. Popular tradition links it to a temple in Jiangnan, the Wei Ling Si, whose monks prepared a decoction of this root. The plant is a vigorous climber of the buttercup family, 3 to 9 m long, with white four-sepalled flowers, growing along woodland edges, riverbanks and hillsides in eastern China, from Anhui to Zhejiang. The rhizome and its fine roots are harvested in autumn; they are frankly pungent and peppery when chewed fresh.

Expelling Wind and Dampness, opening the meridians

In Traditional Chinese Medicine, the root is warm, pungent and salty in flavour. Pungency disperses and sets things in motion, saltiness leads water downwards, and warmth counters Cold. It enters the Bladder meridian, which according to tradition governs the back and the surface, but above all it is credited with opening and travelling through the twelve meridians: “it runs and does not linger”. This is how it expels Wind and Dampness and clears the way where Qi and Blood become blocked in the meridians and joints, what tradition calls Bi, especially when the discomfort moves from one place to another.

A plant of strength, for short courses

This root is not a tonic: tradition describes it as a force, lively and penetrating, suited to robust constitutions. Li Shizhen gave the other side: taken for a long time, it risks harming the true Qi. Ancient texts and modern sources alike therefore reserve it for short courses, reassessed after a few days. It often goes with achyranthes root, which carries the whole towards the lower back, knees and legs, or with Qiang Huo, the plant of the upper body, shoulders and neck.