Eruca sativa, Garden Rocket,
בן-חרדל מצוי , جرجير
One of them went out into the fields to gather herbs and found a wild vine.
He gathered some of its gourds and filled the fold of his cloak.
When he returned, he cut them up into the pot of stew, though no one knew what they were.
The stew was poured out for the men, but as they began to eat it, they cried out,
"O man of God, there is death in the pot!" And they could not eat it.
2 Kings 4:39-40
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| | Scientific name: |
| Eruca sativa Miller |
| Common name: |
| Garden Rocket |
| Hebrew name: |
| בן-חרדל מצוי |
| Arabic name: |
| جرجير |
| Plant Family: |
| Cruciferae / Brassicaceae, מצליבים |
Date Picture Taken: September 2, 2007
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| | Life form: |
| Therophyte, annual |
| Leaves: |
| Alternate, rosette, dissected once, dentate or serrate |
| Flowers: |
| Green, yellow |
| Flowering Period: |
| January, February, March, April |
| Habitat: |
| Batha, Phrygana |
| Distribution: |
| Mediterranean Woodlands and Shrublands, Semi-steppe shrublands, Shrub-steppes, Deserts and extreme deserts |
| Chorotype: |
| Med - Irano-Turanian |
| Summer shedding: |
| Ephemeral |
Date Picture Taken: September 2, 2007
Derivation of the botanical name:
Eruca, Latin name for Eruca sativa or rocket-salad.
sativa, cultivated.
- The standard author abbreviation Miller is used to indicate Philip Miller (1691 – 1771), a botanist of Scottish descent.
Eruca sativa is a native plant of Israel, documented in the old literature of ancient Israel, including Jewish, Classical and Islamic sources up to the Middle ages.
In the Bible Eruca sativa is mentioned as oroth, in Arabic it is called jarjir and in the Talmud it appears as gargir. It can probably be identified with Eruca sativa. Oroth seems not to be a specific plant, but the Aramaic translation is 'vegetables'. The biblical verb aroh, means 'to collect, pick, gather.'
It was found that rocket was used as a garden crop and spice. It was also known as a medicinal plant and was used as an aphrodisiac, for eye infections, and for digestive and kidney problems.
Pliny the elder, Book XX 125-126: "Rocket seed cures the poisons of scorpions and of the shrew-mouse; it keeps off all the little parasites breeding on the body, and removes spots on the skin of the face when applied with honey, freckles when applied with vinegar, reducing livid scars to whiteness when mixed with ox-gall.. Taken in wine it is said to harden as it were the feeling of those about to be flogged. As a seasoning for dishes it imparts such a pleasant flavour that the Greeks have called it euzomon (good broth). It is thought that if the eyes are fomented with slightly pounded rocket, clearness of vision is restored… the coughing of babies is soothed. A decoration of its root in water extracts broken bones. We have already spoken of rocket as an aphrodisiac; if three leaves of wild rocket plunked with the left hand and pounded are drunk in hydromel, they so act."
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