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Calamus Essential Oil
Calamus Acorus calamus; is a semi-aquatic plant that likes to grow with “wet feet”, often alongside Irises, Cattails, and other waterweeds. It likes the edges of ponds, lakes, and rivers. The leaves are similar to Cattail or Iris leaves, being sword shaped, and from 2 1/2 to 3 feet in length. Calamus leaves, are a yellow-green in color, and have a slightly wavy edge) and a midrib. The root is a rhizome, which is a horizontal tuber that runs across the ground. It is marked by leaf scars above, and produces abundant rootlets, which for the most part go straight down. There are no stems, the leaves rise directly from the rhizome.
Though regarded as a native in most counties of England at the present day, where it is now found thoroughly wild on sides of ditches, ponds and rivers, and very abundantly in some districts, it is probably not indigenous. It seems to have been spread in western and central Europe from about the end of the 16th century by means of botanic gardens. The botanist Clusius (Charles de 1'Esduse or Lecluse, 1526-1609) first cultivated it at Vienna from a root received from Asia Minor in 1574
When settlers from Europe came to America, they brought plants from their homeland. Among these was sweet flag (Acorus calamus Linnaeus). Remarkably, the native peoples already knew this plant and had been using it medicinally and ceremonially for centuries. Constantine Samuel Rafinesque (1783-1840) was the first to notice the difference between the European sweet flag and the American. He classified the American species as Acorus calamus variety americanus. The plants are almost identical except the European variety never sets seed, whereas the American does. To make matters confusing, American natives planted their sweet flag wherever they traveled, and European settlers planted their sweet flag likewise. Things became more confusing when people from China and Japan settled in the west and brought the Oriental sweet flag Acorus gramineus Aiton. Botanists basically gave up on the plants and lumped them under 2 species of Acorus in the Araceae, the arum or philodendron family—Acorus calamus, tall and aromatic; Acorus gramineus, short and not aromatic. This classification stood for well over a hundred years.
Recent DNA studies of Acorus showed a few surprises. The European species (actually Asian introduced to Europe by Clusius) Acorus calamus is triploid (3 sets of chromosomes) and hence cannot produce seed. The American species, now named Acorus americanus is diploid (2 sets of chromosomes). Further investigations into Acorus calamus in Asia show the plant has diploid, triploid, and tetraploid (4 sets of chromosomes) forms. A species found in Siberia appears identical to the American. The plants are much older than anyone suspected; fossilized spadices (flowering spikes) found in Tennessee date to the Eocene, 54 to 38 million years ago.
Calamus, sweet-sedge or sweet-flag, shares with the Cuckoo Pint (Arum) the representation in Britain of that order of Monocotyledons. The name is derived from acorus, Gr. axopos, the classical name for the plant. It was the Calamus aromaticus of the medieval druggists and perhaps of the ancients, though the latter has been referred by some to the Citron grass, Andropogon Nardus. The spice " Calamus " or " Sweet-cane " of the Scriptures, one of the ingredients of the holy anointing oil of the Jews, was perhaps one of the fragrant species of Andropogon.
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 Long known for its medicinal value, and cultivated in Asia for this reason. Spicy-scented leaves and fragrant (but rather bitter-tasting) root often are used for sachets, medicines, and candy. Calamus root long was used in a home remedy for colic. The aromatic roots have been used medicinally and ritually by Algonquins, Cree and other NE tribes.
The rhizomes, harvested in autumn or spring, are edible and can be used as a substitute for ginger, cinnamon or nutmeg; in the past were candied and used as a sweetmeat. The inner portion of young stems can be eaten raw and young leaves can be eaten cooked. Other virtues of this plant include its mature leaves, which are insect repellant, the lower stem and rhizome, which can be dried and used to scent clothes, cupboards etc, and an essential oil which can be extracted from the rhizome. Oleum calami is distilled from the rhizomes for use in perfumery and medicine. The rhizomes of Acorus calamus contain an aromatic oil that has been used medicinally since ancient times and has been harvested commercially.
Calamus essential oil is highly esteemed as an aromatic stimulant and tonic, often used for nervous complaints, vertigo, headaches, and dysentery. A fluid extract is an official preparation in the United States and some other Pharmacopceias, but it is not now official in the British Pharmacopceia, though it is much used in herbal medicine as an aromatic bitter. It also acts as a carminative, removing the discomfort caused by flatulence and checking the growth of the bacteria which give rise to this problem. It has been often used to increase the appetite and benefit digestion, given as a fluid extract, infusion or tincture. The tincture is, obtained by macerating the finely-cut rhizome in alcohol for seven days and filtering, is used as a stomachic and flavouring agent. The essential is used as an addition to, and included in inhalations blends.
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