Satureja thymbra | |
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Scientific classification ![]() | |
Kingdom: | Plantae |
Clade: | Tracheophytes |
Clade: | Angiosperms |
Clade: | Eudicots |
Clade: | Asterids |
Order: | Lamiales |
Family: | Lamiaceae |
Genus: | Satureja |
Species: | S. thymbra |
Binomial name | |
Satureja thymbra | |
Synonyms [1] | |
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Satureja thymbra, commonly known as savory of Crete, whorled savory, pink savory, and Roman hyssop (Arabic: za'atar rumi; za'atar franji), [2] is a perennial-green dwarf shrub of the family Lamiaceae, having strongly scented leaves, native to Libya, southeastern Europe from Sardinia to Turkey; Cyprus, Lebanon, Israel and the Palestinian Authority. The plant is noted for its dark-green leaves which grow on numerous, closely compacted branches, reaching a height of 20–50 cm. The plant bears pink to purple flowers that blossom between March and June.
The semi-shrub grows mainly in Mediterranean woodlands and scrubland, adapting well to higher elevations, but also seen on rocky limestone gullies as an undergrowth, and alongside dirt roads. In Israel, the plant is commonly found in the Mount Carmel region, south of Haifa, as well as in the mountainous district of Upper Galilee, in Samaria and in the Judaean Mountains, thriving in areas where the soils are mainly terra rossa and hard limestone, but also in chalk. [3] The plant is rarely found along the coastal plains, or in the Jordan valley.
The leaves of the aromatic plant Satureja thymbra have numerous glandular trichomes of two morphologically distinct types: glandular hairs and glandular scales. [4] The leaves are opposite, entire and smooth. The flowers grow in whorls, and range from pink to purple. Its fruit pods are schizocarps. Satureja thymbra has a fuscous-brown bark, with many erect young shoots, somewhat tetragonal, gland-dotted and pubescent with short downy white hairs.
Its leaves are sessile, generally extending in condensed clusters of inflorescence, consisting of a pair of sessile cymes arranged around an axis and equally spaced, with numerous lanceolate bracts measuring about 5 mm long and 2 mm wide. [5]
An analysis of the plant's chemical composition reveals that the Satureja thymbra, of the kind grown in Israel, contains a very high content of the chemicals γ-terpinene (15.9%), and p-cymene (12.4%), with the highest concentration being that of carvacrol (55.2%). [6] Other independent studies revealed the main compounds of the essential oil ranging at varying levels; carvacrol (34.6%), γ-terpinene (22.9%), p-cymene (13.0%) and thymol (12.8%). [7] Air dried aerial parts from S. thymbra collected in Lebanon and which were submitted to steam distillation using a Clevenger-type apparatus to produce the essential oil were also tested. The extracted oil was dried using anhydrous magnesium sulfate and stored at 4 °C. Analysis revealed that the Lebanese Satureja thymbra oil is characterized by high amounts of γ-terpinene (34.08%), carvacrol (23.07%) and thymol (18.82%).
The pesticidal property of the plant's volatile essential oil and other constituents were tested against an adult tick ( Hyalomma marginatum ), the result being that high concentrations of this oil resulted in the mortality of the tick. [8]
The crushed leaves of this plant have more of a pungent taste and smell than the true hyssop (eizov), for which reason it is not commonly used today as a spice, except in Lebanon, where it is still used as a herbal tea in Lebanese traditional medicine. In ancient times, whorled savory was used as a spice in Anatolia and Greece. In Mishnaic times, the whorled savory was called sī'ah in Hebrew, [9] [10] [11] and is often mentioned in rabbinic literature along with eizov (marjoram) and qurnit (white-leaved savory), three herbal plants that grew naturally in the wild. [12] In ancient times in Israel ( Palestine), water in which whorled savory had been steeped was used to flavor meats that had been skewered and placed over hot coals for roasting. [13] Dioscorides, in the Third Book of his De Materia Medica (3:44–45), alludes to the plant, bringing down its medicinal uses in his day. [14] In ceremonial usage, although it is related to the biblical hyssop, it was considered a different species, thus invalid to be brought in the purification ritual where true hyssop (eizov) was used in the preparation of the sprinkling water to purify those defiled by corpse uncleanness.
Its medicinal use, when concocted into a tea, is said to aid against digestive problems, diarrhea, colic pains, flatulence, intestinal cramps and anorexia. In Israel, the plant Satureja thymbra has protected status, making it a criminal offence to harvest it. [3]
Satureja is a genus of aromatic plants of the family Lamiaceae, related to rosemary and thyme. It is native to North Africa, southern and southeastern Europe, the Middle East, and Central Asia. A few New World species were formerly included in Satureja, but they have all been moved to other genera. Several species are cultivated as culinary herbs called savory, and they have become established in the wild in a few places.
The Jerusalem Talmud or Palestinian Talmud, also known as the Talmud of the Land of Israel, is a collection of rabbinic notes on the second-century Jewish oral tradition known as the Mishnah. Naming this version of the Talmud after Palestine or the Land of Israel—rather than Jerusalem—is considered more accurate, as the text originated mainly from Galilee in Byzantine Palaestina Secunda rather than from Jerusalem, where no Jews lived at the time.
Coleus amboinicus, synonym Plectranthus amboinicus, is a semi-succulent perennial plant in the family Lamiaceae with a pungent oregano-like flavor and odor. Coleus amboinicus is considered to be native to parts of Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, and India, although it is widely cultivated and naturalized elsewhere in the tropics where it is used as a spice and ornamental plant. Common names in English include Indian borage, country borage, French thyme, Indian mint, Mexican mint, Cuban oregano, broad leaf thyme, soup mint, Spanish thyme. The species epithet, amboinicus refers to Ambon Island, in Indonesia, where it was apparently encountered and described by João de Loureiro (1717–1791).
Thymol, C10H14O, is a natural monoterpenoid phenol derivative of p-Cymene, isomeric with carvacrol, found in oil of thyme, and extracted from Thymus vulgaris, ajwain, and various other plants as a white crystalline substance of a pleasant aromatic odor and strong antiseptic properties. Thymol also provides the distinctive, strong flavor of the culinary herb thyme, also produced from T. vulgaris. Thymol is only slightly soluble in water at neutral pH, but it is extremely soluble in alcohols and other organic solvents. It is also soluble in strongly alkaline aqueous solutions due to deprotonation of the phenol. Its dissociation constant (pKa) is 10.59±0.10. Thymol absorbs maximum UV radiation at 274 nm.
Za'atar is a Levantine culinary herb or family of herbs. It is also the name of a spice mixture that includes the herb along with toasted sesame seeds, dried sumac, often salt, and other spices. As a family of related Levantine herbs, it contains plants from the genera Origanum (oregano), Calamintha, Thymus, and Satureja (savory) plants. The name za'atar alone most properly applies to Origanum syriacum, considered in biblical scholarship to be the ezov of the Hebrew Bible, often translated as hyssop but distinct from modern Hyssopus officinalis.
Satureja montana, is a perennial, semi-evergreen herb in the family Lamiaceae, native to warm temperate regions of southern Europe, the Mediterranean, and Africa. It has dark green leaves and summer flowers ranging from pale lavender, or pink to white. The closely related summer savory is an annual plant.
Summer savory is among the best known of the savory genus. It is an annual, but otherwise is similar in use and flavor to the perennial winter savory. It is used more often than winter savory, which has a slightly more bitter flavor.
Carvacrol, or cymophenol, C6H3(CH3)(OH)C3H7, is a monoterpenoid phenol. It has a characteristic pungent, warm odor of oregano.
The tithe is specifically mentioned in the Books of Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. The tithe system was organized in a seven-year cycle, the seventh-year corresponding to the Shemittah-cycle in which year tithes were broken-off, and in every third and sixth-year of this cycle the second tithe replaced with the poor man's tithe. These tithes were akin to taxes for the people of Israel and were mandatory, not optional giving. This tithe was distributed locally "within thy gates" to support the Levites and assist the poor. Every year, Bikkurim, terumah, ma'aser rishon and terumat ma'aser were separated from the grain, wine and oil. Initially, the commandment to separate tithes from one's produce only applied when the entire nation of Israel had settled in the Land of Israel. The Returnees from the Babylonian exile who had resettled the country were a Jewish minority, and who, although they were not obligated to tithe their produce, put themselves under a voluntary bind to do so, and which practice became obligatory upon all.
Cryptocarya agathophylla is a member of the laurel family, Lauraceae, and originates in Madagascar.
Origanum syriacum; syn. Majorana syriaca, bible hyssop, Biblical-hyssop, Lebanese oregano or Syrian oregano, is an aromatic perennial herb in the mint family, Lamiaceae.
Thymus pannonicus, known by its common name Hungarian thyme or Eurasian thyme, is a perennial herbaceous plant, distributed in central and eastern Europe and Russia. It grows over open dry meadows, grasslands, and rocks.
Hyssopus officinalis or hyssop is a shrub in the Lamiaceae or mint family native to Southern Europe, the Middle East, and the region surrounding the Caspian Sea. Due to its purported properties as an antiseptic, cough reliever, and expectorant, it has been used in traditional herbal medicine.
Kil'ayim are the prohibitions in Jewish law which proscribe the planting of certain mixtures of seeds, grafting, the mixing of plants in vineyards, the crossbreeding of animals, the formation of a team in which different kinds of animals work together, and the mixing of wool with linen in garments.
Thymus capitatus is a compact, woody perennial native to Mediterranean Europe and Turkey, more commonly known as conehead thyme, Persian-hyssop and Spanish oregano. It is also known under the name Thymbra capitata.
Impurity of the land of the nations is a rabbinic edict stipulating a specified degree of tumah (impurity) on all lands outside the Land of Israel. The demarcation lines of foreign lands effectually included all those lands not settled by the people of Israel during their return from the Babylonian exile during the Second Temple period, and was meant to dissuade the priests of Aaron's lineage from venturing beyond the Land of Israel where graves were unmarked, and who may inadvertently contract corpse uncleanness and thereby eat their bread-offering (Terumah), unawares, in a state of ritual impurity and becoming liable thereby to kareth. The declaration with respect to foreign lands includes also the "virgin soil" of those lands, and was, therefore, a safeguard meant to prevent the priests from inadvertently transgressing the Law of Moses.
The Mosaic of Reḥob, is a late 3rd–6th century CE mosaic discovered in 1973. The mosaic, written in late Mishnaic Hebrew, describes the geography and agricultural rules of the local Jews of the era. It was inlaid in the floor of the foyer or narthex of an ancient synagogue near Tel Rehov, 4.5 kilometres (2.8 mi) south of Beit She'an and about 6.5 kilometres (4.0 mi) west of the Jordan River. The mosaic contains the longest written text yet discovered in any Hebrew mosaic in Israel, and also the oldest known Talmudic text.
Soda rosmarinus is a perennial-green desert species of saltwort in the Amaranthaceae family. It is endemic to the lower Jordan Valley along the Dead Sea, in Israel and Jordan, and in the Syrian desert, Central Iraq and in the coastal regions of Saudi Arabia, the islands of Bahrain, Qatar, and Iran, commonly known in Arabic by the names ʾušnān and šenān and in the Neo-Aramaic languages by reflexes of ʾuḥlā. It is often used by Bedouins for cleaning as a soap substitute. In medieval Arabic literature, it is also known by the names of "green ushnan" and "launderers' potash", having been used since time immemorial to produce nabulsi soap and as an electuary in compounding theriac for use in treating scorpion stings, as well as for extracting potassium for other medicinal uses.
Nathan ben Abraham, known also by the epithet President of the Academy in the Land of Israel, was an 11th-century rabbi and exegete of the Mishnah who lived in Ramla, in the Jund Filastin district of the Fatimid Caliphate. He was the author of the first known commentary covering the entire Mishnah.
Wild edible plants in the geographical region known as Israel, like in other countries, have been used to sustain life in periods of scarcity and famine, or else simply used as a supplementary food source for additional nourishment and pleasure. The diverse flora of Israel and Palestine offers a wide-range of plants suitable for human consumption, many of which have a long history of usage in the daily cuisines of its native peoples.
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