Rheum
rhubarb; a genus of Polygonex. Calyx inferior, petaloid, sixpartite; stamens about nine; ovary superior; ovule one, erect; styles three, reflexed; stigma, peltate, entire; achenium three-angled, winged, with the withered calyx at the base. R. rhaponticum is the common, or garden rhubarb. It is used in the United States in the making of pies, and is often called pie plant. plant. R. officinale, or R. palmatum, is the officinal rhubarb. R. emodi, in the Punjab Himalaya, from 6,200 to 14,000 feet, with R. moorcroftianum and R. speciforme, are the chief sources of the Himalayan or Indian officinal rhubarb. It is less active than the common kind. The stalks of R. emodi are eaten by the Hindus.
Other Indian species are R. webbianum, R. nobile, R. arboreum, which yields so much honey that the ground under the plants is wet with it, and R. cinabarinum, said to poison goats in Sikkim. R. undulatum grows in China and Siberia. The roots of R. ribes are used by the Arabs as an acidulous medicine, and its leaf-stalks in the preparation of sherbet.
In pharmacy, three leading kinds of rhubarb are recognized: recognized: (1) The Turkey or Russian rhubarb, which is wild neither in the one country nor the other, but used to be brought from China via Turkey, and then from China via Russia; RHEUMATISM (2) the East Indian, and (3) the Batavian rhubarb. An extract, an infusion, a syrup, a tincture, and a wine of rhubarb, with a compound rhubarb pill, are used in pharmacy. In small doses ses rhubarb is stomachic and slighty astringent; in large doses, a purgative, but its action is followed by constipation.