Mayana
Coleus scutellarioides · Coleus
- Names in the book
- Tagalog: Mayana; Visayan: Lampunaya, Dafronaya, Tapunaya, Daponaya
- Colours
- flowerblue, purpleleafred, purple, green
- Native range
- Southeast Asia to Australia
- Family
- Lamiaceae
- Printed as
- Coeus blumei Benth.
- Sources
- Healing Wonders of Herbs (1985), page 113 · Wikipedia
The plant today
Coleus scutellarioides, commonly known as coleus, is a species of flowering plant in the family Lamiaceae (the mint or deadnettle family), native to southeast Asia through to Australia. Typically growing to 60–75 cm (24–30 in) tall and wide, it is a bushy, woody-based evergreen perennial, widely grown for the highly decorative variegated leaves found in cultivated varieties.
Excerpt from “Coleus scutellarioides” on Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Recorded in the Philippines
GBIF holds 666 records of this plant from the Philippines. The ones with map coordinates fall in 50 provinces, most often Zamboanga del Norte (56), Agusan del Sur (45), Metropolitan Manila (30), Davao del Sur (26), Benguet (21), Rizal (13), Laguna (11), Davao Oriental (10), and 42 more.
Counts from GBIF occurrence records, October 2026. They include planted trees and garden plants, and a province with no records may only lack collectors.
What the 1985 book uses it for
A record of home remedies from 1985, with the book's amounts and doses reworded. It is not medical advice.
- Bleeding woundLeaf juice dropped on the wound, crushed leaves as a poultice.A few drops of juice from washed young leaves. Bandage snugly, not tightly.Page 17
- Headaches due to sinusitisHeated leaves laid on the forehead and cheeks.Heat 10 fresh leaves over a flame, four at a time, and swap them as they cool. Twice a day.Page 28
- Sprained ankle or wristCrushed leaves as a poultice.Crush 10 leaves. Leave on for 10 minutes, three times a day.Page 40
Summarised from Herminia de Guzman-Ladion, Healing Wonders of Herbs (Manila: Philippine Publishing House, 1985), where this plant is shown as “Mayana” on page 113. The book is in copyright, so its wording and photographs are not reproduced. Amounts are the book's, restated.
Recent research
The most cited papers since 2022 that name this plant in the title, pulled from Europe PMC in October 2026. Titles are the authors' own and the findings have not been reviewed here.
- Intelligent packaging based on chitosan/fucoidan incorporated with coleus grass (Plectranthus scutellarioides) leaves anthocyanins and its application in monitoring the spoilage of salmon (Salmo salar L.)
- Preparation and characterization of an intelligent film based on fish gelatin and Coleus scutellarioides anthocyanin to monitor the freshness of rainbow trout fish fillet
- The antibacterial effect of Plectranthus scutellarioides (L.) R.Br. leaves extract against bacteria associated with peri-implantitis