[9] Aconitum lycoctonum's name was given by Carl Linnaeus, who found A. lycotonum growing in Lapland, Finland in 1727.

[7] High morphological variability has been described across specimens of A. lycoctonum, however molecular studies showed small genetic distances between populations, and thus A. lycoctonum describes a species complex containing multiple taxa of uncertain taxonomic rank.

The flowers are 18–25 mm long, dark violet, rarely pale yellow.

In A. lycoctonum, the nectary tips are long and highly curled, conducive to specialized pollination.

Alkaloids gigactonine, demethylenedelcorine, 14-O-methyldelphinifoline, and pseudokobusine, lycoctonine, lycaconitine, and myoctonine have been isolated from roots and seeds of A. lycoctonum.

Indeed, A. lycoctonum also does not possess the main alkaloid of A. napellus, aconitine, and while A. napellus was used for its antipyretic and analgesic properties until recent times, the medical use of A. lycoctonum seems to have become obsolete far earlier, it mention limited to ancient texts.