abstract hydrodistilled oil obtained from the aerial parts of artemisia scoparia waldst. & kit. was analysed by capillary gc and gc-ms. the volatile oil of the 10-15 cm high herb was composed mainly of eight monoterpenes (ca. 68.5%), and the predominant constituents were -myrcene (24.4%), -terpinene (18.3%), neral (12.5%) and cis - p -mentha-2-en-1-ol (5.1%). among seven sesquiterpenes (6.9%) present in the oil, the prominent one was -caryophyllene (3.4%). p -cymene (17.4%) and p -cymene-8-ol were the characterized aromatic compounds in the volatile oil. three aliphatic constituents, identified as n -octane, n -heptadecane and n -eicosane, occurred in trace amounts. copyright (c) 2004 john wiley & sons, ltd.