Passionflower (Passiflora incarnata) — the maypop of the Cherokee, flower of quietude and sleep

Passiflora · Passion Flower

An infusion in the evening, to calm rumination before sleep.

To sleep more deeplyTo walk through griefTo unwind in the evening

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✦ Passiflora · Passion Flower · in one breath ✦

The passionate one who learned quietude — she holds you while you weep, and softens the descent.

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5/5

Average · 39 reviews

Breakdown

5 ★39

4 ★0

3 ★0

2 ★0

1 ★0

While many calming herbs don't have much effect on me, the passionflower resin extract is excellent for my insomnia! Highly recommended.

Jean

Dream · 25 September 2024

I wrote a lot of them so much I love your shop. Nothing has changed Fresh passion passion, delicious, powerfully calming, subtle and at the same time strong Plant of choice I also love the Pink Lotus that I recommend at the bottom! And many more Passionflower, perfect to cure nightmares, sleep like a baby and drug withdrawal or just to have fun. My thing is to smoke Passionflower and vaporize it too. everything is excellent! In herbal tea of course or other!

Nébuleuse

Dream · 11 June 2022

Passionflower is fantastic and helpful, I use an assortment of herbs and this one once or twice a day is always pleasant, flower or powder is really good, it lasts a long time too as you don't need to use much. Plus, it goes with elderberry and oolong nicely as well, so you can get creative with it.

James

Dream · 7 February 2025

I love the passionflower tea. I use it often to help me get to sleep. Well packaged too. Will buy again.

Emma

Dream · 26 March 2021

I love this product. The taste is smooth and the effects are gentle. It really helped with my sleep

Emma

Dream · 4 February 2021

I put some Pasioneflower in a teastepe and made a tea of it and drank it and it was very nice. Thanks DreamHerbsTemple

ridlond

Dream · 24 August 2019

Top quality. Really good products. Already made a herbal tea, it calms the mind and prepares for a good sleep.

Lorenzo Galli

Dream · 16 November 2023

Great pharma-herba enhancer for my smoking and tea blends.

devin

Dream · 11 May 2023

I've never tried Passion flower before, kind of a grassy taste and gets some getting use to. feel very relaxed after tho.

Thomas-Jay

Dream · 25 March 2021

I've been drinking this tea in the afternoons and it's really good! The flavor of the tea alone isn't too bitter, and I've mixed it with some of my other herbal teas to great results! I'm working through this bag pretty fast, so I'll probably be ordering again soon. Thank you!

Alyse

Dream · 3 September 2020

Read all 39 reviews →

⊹ ASK YOUR QUESTION ⊹

Ask the Forest about Passiflora · Passion Flower

408 books digested, 97,512 indexed passages. She answers on lineages, synergies, cautions, ritual variations.

⊹ FREQUENT QUESTIONS ⊹

We answer.

What is Passionflower (Passiflora incarnata)?

Officinal passionflower (Passiflora incarnata) is a perennial liana native to the southeastern United States, food and medicine for the Cherokee for millennia under the name pa-su-mi-na or ocoee. She is listed in several modern pharmacopoeias for her traditional evening uses — sleep, nervous agitation, mind that won't rest. INFUSE offers her as whole leaves, powder extract and resin paste, harvested in France, organic.

Why is she called Passion Flower — what link with passion?

The word passion comes from Latin passio, from Greek pathos — "that which is endured, suffering". In 1610 in Mexico, the Augustinian friar Emmanuel de Villegas read in the flower the Passion of Christ (the 5 anthers, the crown of filaments, the 3 stigmas, the tendrils, the 10 petals); the Jesuit Giacomo Bosio published the allegory that became standard. The name therefore evokes the passion-suffering of Christ, not amorous passion — Passionflower soothes inner spinning, not desire.

What are the traditional uses of passionflower?

Three living lineages cross the history of the plant. Among the Cherokee, maypop has been food and medicine for millennia (raw fruits, pounded roots, boiled young shoots). Among the Aztecs in Mexico, Passiflora was described for her sedative, hypnotic and magical properties, and used as a potentiator of other preparations. In the European pharmacopoeia since the 17th century, she is referenced for anxiety, nervous agitation and sleep disorders — uses notably confirmed by the German Commission E.

How do I prepare a passionflower tea?

For whole leaves — 1 to 2 teaspoons in a cup of simmering water (~90°C), infuse 10 to 15 minutes, strain. To drink early evening or 30 minutes before bedtime. The leaves can be reinfused up to 3 times. For powder extract — 1 to 2 teaspoons in a warm drink. For resin paste — a knife tip (size of a rice grain) to dissolve in a warm or lukewarm drink (~50-60°C).

Passionflower and sleep — how to use her in the evening?

Drink the tea around 9 pm, low lights, no screens. A 2020 clinical review (in descriptive statistics) reports an improvement in sleep quality and deep slow-wave sleep among people who consumed the extract. Traditional uses also confirm an effect on insomnia linked to rumination. To combine with Mulungu and Chamomile for the Brazilian "Sleep Trinity" formula.

Does passionflower help during benzodiazepine, cannabis or alcohol withdrawal?

A clinical study published in Frontiers in Psychiatry (2024) reports that passionflower can support benzodiazepine tapering in real-world setting, without documented addictive potential. Traditional and clinical uses also report support in cannabis, opioid and alcohol withdrawal. Any benzodiazepine withdrawal must be done under medical accompaniment — passionflower is an ally, not a substitute for the medical protocol.

What are passionflower's active principles?

Flavonoids are her main compounds — chrysin, apigenin, vitexin, isovitexin, orientin, schaftoside. Chrysin and apigenin are documented as modulators of the GABA-A receptor at the benzodiazepine site. The plant also contains maltol (light sedative aromatic) and traces of beta-carbolines (harmane, harmine, harmaline) at concentrations too low for clinical MAOI effect. The profile is complex — several systems modulated in parallel, which explains the soft and broad effect.

What are the contraindications of passionflower?

Avoid in pregnancy and breastfeeding (lack of solid data). Avoid in combination with sedatives, benzodiazepines, barbiturates, prescription hypnotics (potentiating effect). Avoid with monoamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOI). Caution with anticoagulants (warfarin, aspirin, clopidogrel). Stop at least 2 weeks before scheduled surgery. Avoid before driving or operating machinery. Passiflora family allergy rare but possible. Very low tolerance documented — long-term use considered safe.

⊹ Chapter · Questions ⊹

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⊹ The forest says ⊹

« Every plant is a door. Passiflora · Passion Flower opens onto a long companionship — listen to it more than you measure it. »

Essence

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⊹ CHAPTER II · ESSENCE ⊹

Passionflower has the power to deeply release bodily tensions, mental loads and troubled emotions.

Herb of sensuality, softness, delicacy, but also of inspiration and great passion, Passionflower is an herb of creativity, love, joy of living, relaxation — and much more.

Passion Flower is full of grace; her intoxicating aromas and her delicious taste make her an always welcome infusion for a relaxed evening.

It is said that she received her name from the Spanish missionaries, who considered the plant a symbol of the passion of Christ. Indeed, Passiflora is a very passionate flower! They named the flower and felt that she was the living incarnation of the passion of Christ.

Passionflower comes from Mexico, where the Aztecs already knew her as a calming and magical plant — she entered ritual preparations as an amplifier, never as the main voice.

Passionflower has often been used as a potentiator for different preparations — she can intensify the effects of the great majority of the plants associated with her.

Signature INFUSEIntensity · scored out of 10

Intensity · scored out of 10
sleep-rumination		9/10
the evening descent		9/10
sensuality-softness		8/10
potentiator		9/10
tender weaning		8/10

Registerliving Crown of Thorns, Cherokee *ocoee*, maypop, *Flor de las Cinco Llagas*

Cherokee · Aztec · Villegas-Bosio 1610-1615 · Tennessee

Tradition

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⊹ CHAPTER III · TRADITION ⊹

Three names, three civilisations.

For the Cherokee, she is pa-su-mi-na or ocoee — the Ocoee river in Tennessee takes its name from the plant (its banks were thick with her). A food and medicine plant for millennia: fruits eaten raw or crushed into juice (sometimes thickened with flour or maize), young shoots boiled then fried and mixed with other greens, pounded roots for skin problems, the liver, earaches, weaning babies, washing wounds. Other tribes used her as well: Houma, Rappahannock, Algonquin. Captain John Smith reports in 1612 that the tribes of Virginia were already planting the vine for her fruit — evidence of pre-Columbian indigenous horticulture.

For the Aztecs in Mexico, passionflower entered into ritual preparations as a sedative, hypnotic and amplifier. The flowers have been used by many indigenous communities in South America right up to today.

For the Jesuits of the 17th century, she is Flor de las Cinco Llagas — "Flower of the Five Wounds". In 1610 in Mexico, the Augustinian friar Emmanuel de Villegas draws the flower and reads the Passion of Christ into her: 3 stigmas = the 3 nails of the Crucifixion; 5 anthers = the 5 sacred wounds; the crown of filaments = the Crown of Thorns; 10 petals = the 10 faithful apostles (without Judas or Peter); the tendrils = the whips of the flagellation. Five years later, the Jesuit Giacomo Bosio publishes the complete allegory in Rome — an interpretation that becomes standard across Catholic Europe. A strange reversal: a plant sacred to the Cherokee for millennia becomes a tool of catechism in five years in Rome.

Modern European pharmacopoeia: Passionflower quickly enters the materia medica in the 17th-18th centuries, first as a botanical curiosity, then as a recognised remedy. She is today entered in several national pharmacopoeias, including the German Commission E — the European reference in phytotherapy — for the uses anxiety, nervous restlessness, sleep disorders.

Remarkable botany: Charles Darwin devotes several pages to the passionflower in The Movements and Habits of Climbing Plants (1875). He marvels at the tendrils that coil in precise spirals and that "feel" their environment — sensitivity, response, memory. For Darwin, she is one of the finest proofs of plant intelligence.

Preparation

⊹ CHAPTER IV · PREPARATION ⊹

Passionflower has a floral, soft taste, at once soothing and pleasing. She is best appreciated as a simple tea, particularly in the evening.

→ Whole leaves (50 g · 100 g · 200 g):

1 to 2 teaspoons in a cup of simmering water (~90 °C).
Infuse 5 to 15 minutes depending on the intensity wanted.
Strain. Reusable up to 3 times.

→ Powdered extract (5 g · 20 g):

1 to 2 teaspoons in a cup of hot plant milk or simmering water.
In the evening.

→ Resin paste (5 g · 20 g):

A knife-tip (the size of a grain of rice) to be dissolved in a hot or warm drink (~50-60 °C).
Or directly under the tongue for a slow diffusion.
Ideal for light micro-dosing at the end of the day.

Traditional markers (descriptive): the clinical herbalism materia medica (Wichtl 1989) reports a daily dose of 4 to 8 g of dried plant. Tincture 1:2 or 1:5, 60 to 80 drops in the evening. No prescriptive dosage — each person finds her own.

Suggested ritual

Passionflower loves the evenings when you want to soften everything. A tea at 9 p.m., low lamp, a book, no screen. The nervous system learns that the night is announcing itself — a gradual descent of the diaphragm, the shoulders, the jaw.

For her potentiating function: add a small quantity (a third of the blend at most) to an infusion of another dream plant to intensify its effect — an alliance often practised with Wild Poppy, Blue Lotus, Mugwort, Calea.

Trinity of Sleep (traditional Brazilian formula): Passionflower + Mulungu + Chamomile in equal parts, infused 10 minutes, to be drunk 30 minutes before bed. For the nights when the rumination runs in a loop, when the body is tense for no apparent reason.

We answer.

What is Passionflower (Passiflora incarnata)?

Why is she called Passion Flower — what link with passion?

What are the traditional uses of passionflower?

How do I prepare a passionflower tea?

Passionflower and sleep — how to use her in the evening?

Does passionflower help during benzodiazepine, cannabis or alcohol withdrawal?

What are passionflower's active principles?

What are the contraindications of passionflower?