A condensed materia medica of the 9 members of the genus Tulbaghia [tul-BAG-ee-ah] used as muthi plants in southern Africa. – The Muthi Flora of southern Africa
Tulbaghias belongs to the Alliaceae family. They are herbaceous, often clump-forming perennials with compact tuberous rhizomes bearing thick roots.
Leaves are long and narrow and have an aroma of onions or garlic which is very persistent and it is still present in herbarium specimen found in the Linnaean Herbarium which was collected more than 200 years ago. According to Dahlgren et al. (1985), sulphur compounds are responsible for the strong garlic smell emitted from many of the species when damaged.
Umbels of starry, tubular, purple or white flowers bloom from late spring to fall and can be fragrant.
The genus Tulbaghia was created by Linnaeus (Mant. Pi. p. 148, 1771) based on material sent to Europe in 1769 by C. Rijk van Tulbagh (Ryk Tulbagh), Governor of The Cape of Good Hope from 27 February 1751 to 11 August 1771 under the Dutch East India Company (VOC).
Linnaeus, in fact, used the name Tulbagia, which was corrected into Tulbaghia by P.D. Giseke (Prael. Ord. Nat. PL 274, 1792). The first species to be described, and the basis of the genus, is Tulbaghia capensis.
The genus includes twenty-one species and one variety. Of these nine species are used as muthi and four are actively traded.
Related: The Muthi Flora of southern Africa Facebook Group
Tulbaghia acutiloba Harv. M (Blue List)
The species name acutiloba means ‘sharply pointed lobes’ in Latin and probably refers to the pointed tepals.
Synonyms: Tulbaghia acutiloba Harv. var. major Baker
Common names: wild garlic (E); wildeknoffel (A); isihihi (X); ishaladi lezinyoka (Z); motsuntsunyane, sefothafotha (sS)
Traditional Medicine Usage: Administered to both people and animals. Used to treat barrenness, flu, bad breath, and as an aphrodisiac. The leaves are eaten as a culinary herb. Applied in a magical sense. Cultivated to keep snakes away from the homestead.
Life Cycle: Perennial
Morphology: Geophyte, up to 200 mm tall. Garlic-scented leaves up to 4-5 mm wide, folded and V-shaped in section. Perianth segments are markedly reflexed. Flowers green with corona light brown to purplish brown, with indistinct lobes. Sweetly fragrant almost all year round.
Habitat: Dry Grassland; Mesic Grassland; Dwarf Karroid Shrubland; Zastron Moist Grassland. Grassland, vleis. Alt 100 – 2530m.
Distribution: B, LIM, NW, G, M, S, FS, KZN, L, EC. Botswana, the eastern parts of South Africa, Lesotho, Swaziland and northwards to Zimbabwe.
Trade: Traded as traditional medicine at muthi markets and shops. Popular companion plant with organic gardeners and in grassland gardens. Flowers attract butterflies, bees and other pollinators and are likely to attract moths,
Tulbaghia alliacea L.f. (Blue List)
Synonyms: Tulbaghia narcissi/lorn Salisb. Sensu Podr. Stirp. 219 (1796); Tulbaghia inodora Gaertner, sensu De Fruct. et Sem. PI. 1: 57 (1833); Tulbaghia brachystemma Kunth, sensu Enum. Pi. 4: 483 (1833).
Common names: wild garlic (E), wildeknofflok (A), ishaladi-lezinyoka, isikhwa, umwelela (Z), moelela, sefothafotha (S), ivimba-‘mpunzi (X)
Traditional Medicine Usage: Administered to people only. Rhizome infusions are administered for fits in the Transkei. The Xhosa use it for fevers, rheumatism and paralysis, and as purgatives. Applied in a magical sense. Used as a love charm. Cultivated to keep snakes away from the homestead. Young Sotho men sometimes use lotions when courting.
Life Cycle: Perennial.
Morphology: Geophyte, up to 450 mm. Similar to T. capensis but corona lobes completely fused into a fleshy collar 6 – 8 mm long and upper anthers inserted on it.
Habitat: Alt 50 – 2250 m
Distribution: EC, WC
Trade: Traded as traditional medicine at muthi markets and shops.
Tulbaghia capensis L. (Blue List)
This taxon is the type species of the genus.
Synonyms: T. pulchella Avé-Lall.
Common names: Wild garlic (E), Wildeknoffel (A)
Traditional Medicine Usage: Administered to people only.
Life Cycle: Perennial.
Morphology: Bulbous geophyte, 15 – 35 cm, strongly aromatic. Distinguished from all others in the genus by its deeply lobed and usually very fleshy corona-lobes. Leaves spreading, linear. Flowers brownish to purplish and green with orange corona, corona lobes 6, free or fused below, to 5 mm long.
Habitat: Rocky slopes and flats in clay and loamy soils. Alt 10 – 1500 m
Distribution: It is confined to the winter rain region of South Africa. WC, EC
Trade: Traded as traditional medicine at muthi markets and shops.
Tulbaghia dregeana Kunth
Common names: Wild garlic (E), Wildeknoffel (A)
Traditional Medicine Usage: Administered to people only.
Life Cycle: Perennial.
Morphology: Bulbous geophyte, 15 – 25 cm, strongly aromatic. A very distinct species. It is
easily distinguished from all other species by the very short and fleshy corona and by the perianth segments all inserted at the same level at the base of the corona. Leaves spreading, linear. Flowers cream-coloured to greenish-yellow, corona lobes completely fused into a fleshy ring 2 mm long.
Habitat: Slopes or flats in sandy, clay or loamy soils. Alt ? – 915 m
Distribution: Found around Wupperthal and Worcester northwards to Springbok and Southern Namibia. N, NC, WC
Trade: Not traded.
Tulbaghia leucantha Baker
Synonyms: Tulbaghia dieterleniae E. Phillips
Common names: Wild garlic (E), Wildeknoffel (A)
Traditional Medicine Usage: Administered to people only. Applied in a magical sense.
Life Cycle: Perennial.
Morphology: Geophyte, up to 300 mm high. Leaves with blade linear, wide. Flowers: corona cylindrical, with distinct lobes, margins serrate, orange or scarlet; perianth with segments 4 x longer than broad, margins conspicuously rolled, whitish, green; Sep.-Feb.
Habitat: Vredefort Dome Savanna; Kalahari Deciduous Acacia-wooded Grassland; Dry Grassland; Mesic Grassland. Grassland, rocky areas. Alt 30 – 2325 m.
Distribution: N, LIM, NW, G, M, S, FS, KZN, L, NC, WC, EC
Trade: Not traded.
Tulbaghia ludwigiana Harv.
Common names: Wild garlic (E), Wildeknoffel (A), umwelela-kweliphesheya (Z)
Traditional Medicine Usage: Administered to people only. Applied in a magical sense. Rhizomes are used by men as loved charms to attract girls or to cause their girlfriends to think of them when they are far away from one another.
Life Cycle: Perennial.
Morphology: Geophyte, 25 – 91cm tall. Leaves broader than 8 mm. Style and stigma forming a thick, apical depressed column. Flowers greenish-brown with corona lobes bright yellow to orange, ± entire. This species is closely allied to T. cernua but it is easily distinguished by the very broad, lorate leaves which have a more or less distichous arrangement and lie flat on the ground.
Habitat: Grassland. Alt 15 – 2325 m.
Distribution: M, S, KZN, EC
Trade: Traded as traditional medicine at muthi markets and shops.
Tulbaghia natalensis Baker
Common names: Wild garlic (E), Wildeknoffel (A), isweli lenyoka (Z)
Traditional Medicine Usage: Applied in a magical sense. Cultivated to keep snakes away from the home.
Life Cycle: Perennial.
Morphology: Geophyte, 15 – 36cm tall. A rather attractive species with showy white flowers.
Habitat: Found in vleis and in marshy habitats. Alt 150 – 1860 m.
Distribution: KZN, EC
Trade: Not traded.
Tulbaghia simmleri PBeauv.
Synonyms: T. fragrans I.Verd., T. daviesii Grey, T. pulchella P.E.Barnes,
Common names: sweet wild garlic, sweet garlic, fragrant tulbaghia (E); soetwildeknoffel, aandblommetjie (A)
Traditional Medicine Usage: Administered to people only.
Life Cycle: Perennial.
Morphology: Geophyte, up to 40cm tall. Tulbaghia simmleri is a very decorative and fairly hardy species widely cultivated, usually under the name of T. fragrans or T. pulchella, in parks and gardens.
Habitat: Endemic of a rather small area of Mpumalanga and Limpopo, in the northern Drakensberg. It is found as isolated plants on rocky ledges and in fairly thick colonies in light tropical forest, together with Clivia miniata, epiphytic orchids (mostly Polystachia sp.), and Ferns. Alt 960 – 1120 m.
Distribution: LIM, M
Trade: Not traded.
Tulbaghia violacea Harv. (Blue List)
Synonyms: Tulbaghia cepacea L.f.; Omentaria cepacea Salisb
Common names: Wild garlic (E), Wildeknoffel (A), utswelane (X.); isihaqa, incinsini (Z)
Traditional Medicine Usage: Administered to people only. Pounded tuber decoctions are administered as enemas for stomach ailments. The Zulus use the leaves and flowers as spinach and as a hot, peppery seasoning with meat and potatoes. Applied in a magical sense. Tuber infusions are taken as love charm emetics. Cultivated to keep snakes away from the home.
Life Cycle: Perennial.
Morphology: Bulbous geophyte, 20 – 35 cm, strongly aromatic. Leaves suberect, linear, glaucous. Flowers mauve, corona lobes 3, free, to 2 mm long.
Habitat: Karroid bush and forest margins and stream banks. Alt 3 – 1220 m.
Distribution: KZN, WC, EC
Trade: Traded as traditional medicine at muthi markets and shops.
Related: The Muthi Flora of southern Africa Facebook Group
References
Taxonomy
Canio G. Vosa (2000) A revised cytotaxonomy of the genus Tulbaghia (Alliaceae), Caryologia, 53:2, 83-112, DOI: 10.1080/00087114.2000.10589184
Arnold. T.H.. Prentice, C.A., Hawker, L.C., Snyman, E.E., Tomalin, M., Crouch, N.R. and Pottas-Bircher, C. (2002). Medicinal and magical plants of southern Africa: an annotated checklist. Strelitzia 13. South African National Biodiversity Institute, Pretoria.
Traditional Medicine Usage
Arnold. T.H.. Prentice, C.A., Hawker, L.C., Snyman, E.E., Tomalin, M., Crouch, N.R. and Pottas-Bircher, C. (2002). Medicinal and magical plants of southern Africa: an annotated checklist. Strelitzia 13. South African National Biodiversity Institute, Pretoria.
Hutchings, A., Scott, A.H., Lewis, G., Cunnigham, A.B., (1996). Zulu Medicinal Plants: an inventory. University of Natal
Life Cycle, Morphology, Habitat, and Distribution information.
Germizhuizen, G. & Meyer, N.L. (eds) 2003. Plants of southern Africa: an annotated checklist. Strelitzia 14. South African National Biodiversity Institute, Pretoria.
e-Flora of South Africa. v1.21. 2018. South African National Biodiversity Institute, Pretoria. http://ipt.sanbi.org.za/iptsanbi/resource?r=flora_descriptions&v=1.21
Additional Reading
The Muthi Flora of southern Africa Facebook Group
National Vegetation Map – South African National Biodiversity Institute
I know this little plant. They like to plant these flowers at spa’s and game reserves in huge flower beds. Now I know why, snakes.
The Xhosa people use the Tulbaghia alliacea for fevers. rheumatism and paralysis. I believe they use it orally. What part/s of the plant do they use and how eg tincture?