Medicinal uses Uses supported by clinical data None. Uses described in pharmacopoeias and well established documents As a sedative for the treatment of nervous tension and insomnia. Treatment of dyspepsia and lack of appetite (5, 15–17). Uses described in traditional medicine Treatment of abdominal cramps, anaemia, bacterial infections, dermatitis, diarrhoea, dysmenorrhoea, leukorrhoea, migraine and oedema (6). As an analgesic, anthelminthic, antipyretic, aphrodisiac, carminative, depurative, digestant, diuretic, diaphoretic and tonic (6). Contraindications Strobilus Lupuli is contraindicated in cases of known allergy to the plant material.

Culpepper’s view on hops was that a “decoction of the tops cleanses the blood, cures the venereal disease, and all kinds of scabs, itch, and other breakings out of the body; as also tetters, ringworms, spreading sores, the morphew, and all discolourings of the skin”.

The English name, hop, comes from the Anglo-Saxon hoppan (to climb).