Wu Yao – Lindera Root – Radix Linderae

Wu Yao

English Name: lindera root

Literal Translation: “black medicine”

Pharmaceutical Name: Radix Linderae

Medica Category: Qi-Regulating Herbs

Properties: Wu Yao enters the Urinary Bladder, Kidney, Lung, and Spleen channels; it is acrid in nature and warm in temperature.

What is Wu Yao?:

The Chinese Herb Wu Yao is dried roots from lindera (Lindera strychnifolia (Sieb. Et. Zucc.), an evergreen spicebush that grows wild throughout East Asia with broad, beautiful heart-shaped leaves and small yellow-green flowers that beget black berries in the fall. The roots are dug up in the early fall, cleaned of fibrous material, sliced, and sun-dried for use as medicine.

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) Therapeutic Actions of Wu Yao:

Wu Yao regulates qi and disperses cold to address abdominal, epigastric, and hypochondriac pain. It goes to the Kidney channel, making is especially helpful to address (cold) hernial pain.

Wu Yao warms the Kidney and disperses cold in the Kidney and Urinary Bladder channel to address enuresis that stems from Kidney deficiency (when the Kidney energy is too deficient to hold the urine back in the bladder).