Origin

Jamaica

Folk medicinal uses

In addition to the use of the bitter cassava for the preparation of starch. the grated tuber is said to make an excellent poultice for sores. This use, which persists, is recorded by the early writers such as Browne who says that in the case of very foul sores the cassava flour, still containing some of the juice, should be mixed up with pounded tobacco leaves. Barham recommends a poultice made with cassava bread, milk and sweet oil to ripen boils. The tubers are used in a similar manner in Africa.

Asprey, G.F; Phylis Thornton/ Medicinal plants of Jamaica. Parts III & IV. – p. 57.