The fresh rhizomes were washed, air dried and thinly grated while the dry rhizomes were washed, sun dried and pulverized into a fine powder. 100 g of both types of rhizome preparations were subjected to hydrodistillation, separately, in a Clevenger’s type apparatus for 5 h according to European Pharmacopoeian (1983) procedure. The light yellow colored oil obtained (yield 1.4% for fresh and 2.9% for dry rhizomes) was dried over minimum amount of anhydrous sodium sulfate and stored at 4 ± 1 °C.