Melissa officinalis

Spices and Herbs
Balm (Melissa officinalis, Linn.), a perennial herb of the natural order Labiatæ. The popular name is a contraction of balsam, the plant having formerly been considered a specific for a host of ailments. The generic name, Melissa, is the Greek for bee and is an allusion to the fondness of bees for the abundant nectar of the flowers. Balm is a native of southern Europe, where it was cultivated as a source of honey and as a sweet herb more than 2,000 years ago. It is frequently mentioned in Greek and Latin poetry and prose. Because of its use for anointing, Shakespeare referred to it in the glorious lines

"Not all the water in the rough, rude sea
Can wash the balm from an anointed king."

As a useful plant it received attention from the pen of Pliny. From its home it has been introduced by man as a garden plant into nearly all temperate climates throughout the world, and is often found as an escape from gardens where introduced—occasionally in this role in the earliest settled of the United States. Very few well-marked varieties have been produced. A variegated one, now grown for ornament as well as for culinary purposes, is probably the same as that mentioned by Mawe in 1778.
Spices and Herbs

History of Herbs

It seems probable that many of the flavoring herbs now in use were similarly employed before the erection of the pyramids and also that many then popular no longer appear in modern lists of esculents.

Of course, this statement is based largely upon imperfect records, perhaps, in many cases only hints more or less doubtful as to the various species. But it seems safe to conclude that a goodly number of the herbs discussed in this volume, especially those said to be natives of the Mediterranean region, overhung and perfumed the cradle of the human race in the Orient and marked the footsteps of our rude progenitors as they strode more and more sturdily toward the horizon of promise.

This idea seems to gain support also from the fact that certain Eastern peoples, whom modern civilization declares to have uneducated tastes, still employ many herbs which have dropped by the wayside of progress, or like the caraway and the redoubtable "pusley," an anciently popular potherb, are but known in western lands as troublesome weeds.

Relying upon Biblical records alone, several herbs were highly esteemed prior to our era; in the gospels of Matthew and Luke reference is made to tithes of mint, anise, rue, cumin and other "herbs"; and, more than 700 years previously, Isaiah speaks of the sowing and threshing of cumin which, since the same passage (Isaiah xxviii, 25) also speaks of "fitches" (vetches), wheat, barley and "rie" (rye), seems then to have been a valued crop.
History of Herbs