 The root chewed hath a certain aromatick taste ioyned with acrimony, wherfore it seems hot in the second degree.Thus far "Monardus".” 


Seventeenth century medical and botanical writers were confused about the identity of the root, with Gaspard Bauhin or Bauhinus misidentifying the Contrayerva and Radix Drakena as the root of a "Cyperus" sedge, and others misidentifying it with the Mexican "Coanenepilli", a Passionflower vine, described by the Spanish naturalist and physician Francisco Hernández de Toledo.The "United States Pharmacopoeia and the National Formulary" (1927) says that the root of "Dorstenia contrajerva" contains contrayerbine, cajapine, volatile oil, resin, a bitter principle, and starch.