Artichoke

The artichoke plant develops a substantial form. Its leaves spread widely, are twice pinnately divided, with clear gaps between the individual segments. The richly enlarged flower head becomes extraordinarily heavy, and the numerous involucral bracts provide firm external support. They are fleshy inside and, when harvested shortly before flowering, serve as valuable vegetables.

In every respect, the plant goes into fullness and brims with juice. The leaf is watery and of low firmness. A piece of leaf can easily be crushed between the fingers; it has no internal structure that might resist dissolution. When the leaves are handled vigorously during harvest or processing, the hands become coated with a waxy, astringent substance.

These are the bitter-tasting sesquiterpene lactones, which are produced by glandular hairs on the surface of the artichoke plant – a Mediterranean cultivated plant. During rain, the bitter substances can be easily washed off, as they are only localised on the outer side of the leaf. These substances have an astringent effect and thus stand in polarity to the plant's striking exuberance.

The waxy bitter substances seem to encase and structure the plant from outside like a shell. The artichoke expresses overflowing life forces, which are dampened and structured from outside. This limiting principle, which acts from outside on the watery interior of the plant, is especially evident in the flowers. We recognise immoderation in the very large and heavy artichoke flower, which is limited by the mantle of tough involucral bracts. In the bud stage, the artichoke is completely enclosed by the bracts, and in the flowering stage the mantle forms only a small opening as space for the fine violet flower hairs.

The essence of the plant, which has a structuring and form-giving force, has not penetrated deeply into the interior in the artichoke. It consolidates and limits the body especially from outside, as is the case in the animal kingdom for example with a snail. In this sense, the artichoke is the snail among plants.

Since the essence of the artichoke has not strongly bound itself to the matter, its contribution as an active principle is less than in other plants. On the other hand, this rather weakly penetrating essence makes the artichoke an ideal medicinal product for arteriosclerosis. In this disease, we see a loss of youthful life forces, whereby the structuring essences of the human being work crystallisingly and hardeningly deep into the vessels. Preparations made from artichoke leaves – taken regularly – can be counted among the best agents for the prevention of arteriosclerosis and the delay of ageing processes.