Witnessed by: Ayurveda
Mat sedge (Cyperus tegetum), of the Cyperaceae family. Tufted perennial sedge of standing water, with slender three-angled culms rising from creeping rhizomes that bear small hard tubers; native range: marsh, tank-margin and wet paddy ground of eastern India and Bangladesh, cultivated in Bengal and Orissa. Globally recognized as kaivarta mustā · plava · jala-mustā in Sanskrit, gundra · kaivarta musta in Hindi, madur kathi in Bengali, and mat sedge, madur grass in English. The part used is tuber (rhizome). Small hard dark-brown tubers ringed with scales and fibres, faintly aromatic; the taste bitter and astringent with a cool finish.
In this cross-tradition database, we analyze how this substance operates across world medicine systems — tracking its traditional tastes, temperatures, tissue affinities, post-digestive effects, and planetary correspondences across Ayurveda, Unani, and Western herbalism.
MAT SEDGE
IDENTITY
Name
- Common
- mat sedge
- Scientific name
- Cyperus tegetum Roxb.
- Family
- Cyperaceae
Form
- Part used
- tuber (rhizome)
PROPERTIES
Nature
Taste
how the plant declares itself on the tongue
- Ayurveda
- bitter (tikta) · astringent (kashaya)
Temperature
- Ayurveda
- cooling (shita)
PRACTICE
Virtue
Actions
- Ayurveda
- jwaraghna (antipyretic), daha-prashamana (allays burning), trishna-nigrahana (quenches thirst), grahi (holds a loose bowel), deepana-pachana (kindles and digests), stanya-shodhana (purifies the milk)
Cautions
- Contraindications
- vata conditions with dryness and constipation; it is drying and holding
- Toxicity
- none of note
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