Talk:Witch-hazel

message: The sentence: "The name Witch has its origins in Middle English wiche, from the Old English wice, meaning "pliant" or "bendable"." seems questionable to me, since this is not a European plant, and the American colonists did not speak middle English. Were the Chinese or Japanese species grown in England before the 15th century? --SB_Johnny|talk|books 12:06, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The OED agrees with this etymology of the word "witch" as meaning pliant. Where the "witch hazel" grew and when is not relevant to the etymology of "witch".--Shantavira 08:06, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

text: Writing wikipedia is rather easier than that, as we just need to figure out what the sources say, not research the topic. As long as the dictionaries say "pliant" we should go with that, unless perhaps if there are good sources to the contrary. I don't have an OED handy, but I did add a citation to the Online Etymological Dictionary. Kingdon (talk) 19:50, 14 December 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Despite the denial in the English article that 'witch' has anything to with magic or sorcery, I'm struck by the fact that the German and Dutch names for the plant are 'Zaubernuss' (= magic nut) and 'toverhazelaar' (= magic hazel) respectively. So just how reliable is the source on 'pliancy'?84.243.236.9 (talk) 15:50, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
thread_title: Middle English?

message: This section should refer to the use of the plant as an ingredient in human food.
The use given in this article as an insect food, should be titled something like:
:Ecology, role in food chain. 
or 
:Interactions with other (non human) spices.
if biologists agree.
Moreover, this pages may be a source for data mining, information retrieval, etc. if more precise titles are used in a consistent way.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Elias (talk • contribs) 17:24, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed, especially since that section was under "Cultivation and uses". I've made the edit. As for "official" section headings, I more or less try to follow Wikipedia:WikiProject Plants/Template, although it isn't intended to rigidly apply to all articles. Kingdon (talk) 03:26, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Food uses should refer to culinary uses. 

message: As far as I can see, witch hazel (witch-hazel) and hamamelis are exactly the same plant. However, they have become separated in Wikipedia, with different language versions. Thus there's no Dutch version under 'witch hazel', but there is one under 'hamamelis', and there are German, English, Norwegian and Upper Sorbian versions under both, but they don't match. Finally, there are only 5 language versions under 'hamamelis', and 27 under 'witch hazel'. The two sets of articles have evidently been written by people who were unaware of the other one - a common failing in Wikipedia! Not being a botanist, I have no idea which information is more accurate. I wanted to check if the Dutch plant 'toverhazelaar' and the English 'witch hazel' were the same, and was surprised to find there was no Dutch version of the 'witch hazel' article - then I looked for the Dutch term and discovered it in the 'hamamelis' article.
I've put a similar comment on the talk page for 'hamamelis'.84.243.236.9 (talk) 15:50, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: They are not the same. Witch-hazel refers to the genus Hamamelis containing all Hamamelis species. Hamamelis × intermedia is just one species within the genus. Darorcilmir (talk) 18:32, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Merge with article on hamamelis? 

message: I may have overlooked something, but I can't see any reference to pain relief - and I have personal experience of witch hazel being used for this. When I was 10 years old, someone accidentally slammed a car door on the tips of my fingers - the nails on the two longest fingers turned black and eventually fell off, and the pain was awful and went on for weeks (though luckily nothing was broken). My mother had once been a registered nurse in Britain (so I'm not talking about someone who relied on 'natural' remedies - she was a firm believer in Western medicine, and took me to be vaccinated against polio when the Salk vaccine first became available in the 1950s). She went to the pharmacy, bought what she called 'witch hazel' (perhaps the 'witch hazel water' referred to in the article), and applied it to my painful finger tips. The effect was never long-lasting, so she kept on applying it, and let me tell you it helped! It also smelled nice, which helped too.84.243.236.9 (talk) 16:08, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: The answer seems adequately provided in the section and sources on Safety. Witch hazel solutions were systematically evaluated in a condition of more serious pain - perineal tears following childbirth, PMID 22592710 - finding no better effect than using ice (which was probably too inconvenient for a nurse to recommend for sore fingers ;>). --Zefr (talk) 16:25, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Applications 

message: I was looking for information about the witch hazel you can buy at a pharmacy. I landed on the plant page. Went disambig; went with the one about the astringent, and landed back here. 
 >  (Redirected from Witch hazel (astringent))
 >   This article is about the plant genus. For other uses, see Witch hazel (disambiguation).
If you're going to combine the articles could you add a Witch hazel U.S.P. section?
173.120.182.205 (talk) 15:40, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Witch hazel U.S.P. 

message: and is commonly used for folk remedies in the European Union.
Only in the European Union, no European countries not in the EU use it for folk remedies?  Probably should have "European Union" replaced with "Europe".
83.20.190.190 (talk) 18:22, 2 March 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: Yup. Feel free to do such utterly obvious things without asking. --jpgordon𝄢𝄆 𝄐𝄇  19:19, 2 March 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: I took it further and removed the "common in Europe" part, since the sources didn't indicate any such thing. --jpgordon𝄢𝄆 𝄐𝄇  21:14, 2 March 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  EU versus Europe