Chapter 539

1328The Cucumis colocynthus of Linnæus, or Coloquintida, so remarkable for its bitterness.

1329It is an extremely drastic, and indeed violent purgative.

1330Recurring at stated times. The absurdity of this statement does not require discussion.

1331The cultivated cucumber, Fée says.

1332Or “aposthumes,” a kind of abscess, probably.

1333“Ignis sacer,” literally “sacred fire.” It is sometimes called “St. Anthony’s fire.” Celsus, in describing it, distinguishes it, however, from erysipelas, and divides it into two kinds.

1334On the contrary, Fée says, the pulp of the gourd is tough and leathery, extremely insipid, and destitute of any salutary qualities.

1335A decoction of rape or turnips is still recommended for chilblains at the present day. Fée remarks that ground mustard is much preferable.

1336This, as Fée remarks, he says of nearly all the vegetable productions known.

1337It is only suited as an aliment to a strong stomach, and it is owing to the property here mentioned that the School of Salerno says,—Ventum sæpe capis, si tu vis vivere rapis.andRapa juvat stomachum, novit producere ventum.

1337It is only suited as an aliment to a strong stomach, and it is owing to the property here mentioned that the School of Salerno says,—

Ventum sæpe capis, si tu vis vivere rapis.

and

Rapa juvat stomachum, novit producere ventum.

1338Dioscorides and Galen say the same, but this property is not recognized in modern times.

1339“Eruca:” a plant itself of a very stimulating nature.

1340The Brassica napus, var.αof Linnæus, the Brassica asperifolia, var.αof Decandolles, the “navette” of the French. An oil is extracted from the seed, very similar to the Colza oil, extracted from the Brassica oleracea.

1341It is in reality of a blackish hue without, and white within.

1342See B. xxii. c.73. Dioscorides speaks of the use of the wild rape for this purpose, B. ii. c. 135.

1343See B. xviii. c.35, and B. xix. c.25.

1344Dalechamps remarks that Pliny here confounds the bunion with the bunias; the first of which, as Fée says, is an umbellifera, either the Bunium bulbocastanum of Linnæus, or the Peucedanum silaus of Linnæus, and the second is the Brassica napo-brassica of Linnæus. Dioscorides says that the stalks of the bunion are quadrangular. M. Fraas thinks that the bunion is the Bunium pumilum of modern Botany, and says that the Bunium bulbocastanum, usually supposed to be the bunion of Dioscorides, is a stranger to Greece.

1345These properties, Fée says, are not to be found in the Bunium bulbocastanum of modern botanists.

1346Sillig is of opinion that there is an hiatus here in the text, and that the meaning is that a drachma of the juice is taken with something else: honey possibly, he suggests.

1347The Brassica napo-brassica of Linnæus.

1348See B. xix. c.26.

1349The Cochlearia Armoracia of Linnæus.

1350In B. xix. c.26.

1351Fée says that the medicinal properties recognized by the moderns in the several varieties of the Raphanus sativus are, that their action is slightly stimulating when eaten raw, and that boiled and eaten with sugar they are soothing, and act as a pectoral.

1352“Lagonoponon.” Nearly all these asserted virtues of the radish, Fée says, are illusory.

1353“Phlegmoni.” Stagnation of the blood, with heat, redness, swelling, and pain.

1354“Veternosi.” Fée says that, rigorously speaking, “veternus” was that state of somnolency which is the prelude to apoplexy.

1355The Coluber cerastes of Linnæus. See B. viii. c. 35.

1356Poinsinet warns us not to place too implicit faith in this assertion.

1357Dioscorides says the same, but the assertion is quite destitute of truth.

1358Nicander, in his “Alexipharmaca,” ll. 430 and 527, says that the cabbage,notthe radish, is good for poisoning by fungi and henbane; and in l. 300 he states that the cabbage is similarly beneficial against the effects of bullock’s blood. Pliny has probably fallen into the error by confoundingῥάφανος, the “cabbage,” withῥαφανίς, the “radish.”

1359Themistocles is said to have killed himself by taking hot bullock’s blood. It is, however, very doubtful.

1360“Morbus comitialis”—literally the “comitial disease.” Epilepsy it is said, was so called because, if any person was seized with it at the “Comitia” or public assemblies of the Roman people, it was the custom to adjourn the meeting to another day.

1361Fromμέλας, “black,” andχολή, “bile.” Melancholy, or bad spirits, was so called from a notion that it was owing to a predominance of an imaginary secretion called by the ancients “black bile.”

1362The cœliac flux, Fée says, is symptomatic of chronic enteritis; and is a species of diarrhœa, in which the chyme is voided without undergoing any change in passing through the intestines.

1363“Præcordiorum.”

1364“Enterocele.”

1365De Morb. Mulier. B. ii. c. 67.

1366Eating or corroding ulcers.

1367Hippocrates, De Diætâ, B. ii. cc. 25, 26, says that radishes are of a cold, and hyssop of a warm, nature.

1368“Moloche agria.”

1369See B. xix. c.27.

1370See B. viii. c. 73.

1371De Remed. B. iv. c. 24. The parsnip is a stimulating plant, and it is not without reason, Fée says, that Celsus recommends it for this purpose.

1372Or “wild.” See B. xix. c.27.

1373This seed, Fée says, is an energetic excitant, and certainly would not be found suitable for any of the purposes here mentioned by Pliny; though equally recommended for them by Galen, Dioscorides, and in Athenæus.

1374Tetanus, or contraction of the muscles, in which the head is twisted round or stretched backwards.

1375“Axungia;” properly swine’s grease, with which the axle-trees of chariots were rubbed. See B. xxviii. c. 9.

1376Diphilus of Siphnos, as quoted in Athenæus, B. ix. c. 3, states that the ancients employed this plant as a philtre, for which reason it was called by some personsφίλτρον.

1377“Posca.” This was the ordinary drink of the lower classes at Rome, as also the soldiers when on service, and the slaves. “Oxycrate” is the scientific name sometimes given to vinegar and water.

1378Πολλὰ Σύρων λάχανα.Similar to our proverb, probably, “There is more corn in Egypt.”

1379The Daucus visnaga of Linnæus, the Daucus gingidium of Sprengel, the Visnagha, or Bisnagha of other botanists. It is also known as the “wild carrot,” or “French carrot.”

1380Or “erratic.”

1381See B. xix. c.28.

1382The root and seed, Fée observes, really are stimulants: there is no perceptible difference between the wild and cultivated plants. For silphium, see B. xix. c.15.

1383Fée thinks that it may be so in a slight degree.

1384Pliny often speaks of persons having swallowed quicksilver, but never lets us know under what circumstances. As Fée remarks, it could not be accidentally; nor yet, on the other hand, could it have been done purposely, with the object of committing suicide, it not being an active poison. He concludes that it must have been taken medicinally, and that part of it becoming absorbed in the system, other remedies were resorted to, to counteract its noxious effects.

1385“Inutile,” and not “utile,” is evidently the correct reading here.

1386Σισάρονthe “skirret,” andΣέσελι, Σέλι, orΣίλι, “hart-wort.”

1387The Seseli tortuosum of Linnæus.

1388Or Marseilles: the Seseli tortuosum. Fée says that there is great confusion relative to the supposed varieties of this plant. The Bupleurum fruticosum, or Seseli of Æthiopia, has leaves smaller than those of ivy, and resembling the leaves of honeysuckle. That of Peloponnesus, the Ligusticum austriacum, has a leaf similar to that of hemlock, but larger and thicker; and the Seseli of Crete, some species of the genus Tordylium, is a small plant which throws out shoots in large quantities. All these, he says, are so far different plants, that it is quite impossible to unite them with any degree of certainty under one concordance. Indeed, he thinks it very possible that they do not all belong to the genus Seseli of modern botanists.

1389It is clear that Pliny hesitates to believe this story, and it is hardly necessary to remark how utterly foreign this is to the habits of carnivorous birds.

1390See B. viii. c. 50. An absurd story.

1391The Inula Helenium of botanists. See B. xix. c.29.

1392Modern notions, Fée says, do not agree with those of the ancients on the subject of elecampane. The root owes the energy of its action to the camphor which it contains.

1393This notion of the virtues of the onion is quite erroneous, though it still prevails to a considerable degree. Hippocrates, however, Dioscorides, and Galen, like Pliny, attribute this property to the onion.

1394This, Fée says, is not the fact.

1395A disease of the eye, by which the cornea contracts a whiteness.

1396A white speck within the black of the eye.

1397It is of no use whatever for such a purpose.

1398Fox evil, or scurf, or scaldhead: a disease which causes the hair to fall off the body. It derives its name from the Greekἀλώπηξ, a “fox,” from the circumstance that they were supposed to be peculiarly affected with a similar disease.

1399Or millepedes. See c.6of this Book.

1400So the school of Salerno says—Non modicum sanas Asclepius asserit illas,Præsertim stomacho, pulchrumque creare colorem.

1400So the school of Salerno says—

Non modicum sanas Asclepius asserit illas,Præsertim stomacho, pulchrumque creare colorem.

Non modicum sanas Asclepius asserit illas,

Præsertim stomacho, pulchrumque creare colorem.

1401This is not the case.

1402“Vermiculis.” Small worms or maggots.

1403“Porrum sectivum.” See B. xix. c.33.

1404Fée thinks that boiled leeks may possibly, with some justice, be ranked among the pectorals.

1405This, as Pliny himself here remarks, is a different disease from that previously mentioned in c. 6 of this Book.

1406From the Greekσυκὴ, “a fig.”

1407“Merum.”

1408They would be of no utility whatever.

1409This is an unfounded statement, Fée says.

1410See B. xix. c.33. Aristotle, Sotion, and Dioscorides state to the same effect.

1411“Porrum capitatum.”

1412There is no difference now recognized between these two kinds of leeks, so far as their medicinal effects are concerned.

1413See B. xvi. c. 9.

1414I. e.gum arabic. For an account of the Acacia Nilotica, see B. xiii. c. 19.

1415De Morb. Mul. B. ii. c. 89, and De Steril. c. 13.

1416This is not the fact.

1417See B. xix. c.34.

1418Fée says that the action of garlic is so powerful, that it is one of the most energetic vermifuges known; but at the same time it is so strong an excitant, that it is very liable to cause worse evils than the presence even of worms.

1419This serpent is described by Lucan, in the “Pharsalia,” B. ix. l. 708,et seq., where a fearful account is given of the effects of its sting. Nicander, in his “Theriaca,” informs us that those bitten by the hæmorrhoïs die with the blood flowing from the nose and ears, whence its name.

1420Pard or panther-strangle. See B. xxvii. c. 2. The juice of garlic has no such effect as here stated.

1421De Morb. Mul. B. i. c. 74.

1422See B. xxix. c. 39.

1423The Morbus pedicularis. From the frequent mention of it, Fée says, it would seem to have been very prevalent in ancient times; whereas now, it is but rarely known.

1424A disease of the skin; supposed by some to be the same as ringworm. The word is employed in modern medicine to signify skin diseases in general, such as itch, lichen, scaldhead, ringworm, &c.

1425Pintianus suggests “hirudines,” “leeches,” and not “arundines,” arrows. The latter reading is supported, however, by Plinius Valerianus and M. Empiricus.

1426An expensive kind of fish-sauce: for some further account of it see B. ix. c. 30.

1427See B. xix. c.15.

1428See B. x. c. 78.

1429“Caprina.” See B. xxvi. c. 39.

1430Fée is of opinion that this in reality is not a lettuce, but that Pliny has been led, by the milky juice which it contains, to that conclusion. In B. xxvi. c. 39, he calls it “tithymalum.” Hardouin conjectures it to have been the spurge, or Euphorbia lathyris of Linnæus, the juice of which is a violent drastic; and Fée is of opinion that it must have been one of the Euphorbiaceæ. At the same time, he says, powerful as their properties are, we cannot believe that they exercise the destructive effects on fish here stated.

1431Fée thinks that this plant may be looked for among the varieties of the Sonchus or the Hieracium, which belong to the same family as the lettuce.

1432See B. xviii. c.14.

1433Fée thinks that this is the Isatis tinctoria of Linnæus in a wild state, and Littré suggests that the one next mentioned is the same plant, cultivated. Fée says, however, that this plant, employed in dyeing wool, does not contain any milky juice, a fact which should have cautioned Pliny against classing it among the Lactucæ.

1434Of the lettuce, evidently. Fée says, who would recognise a lettuce, with its green leaves, and smooth stalk and leaves, under this description? Still, it is by no means an inaccurate description of the wild lettuce.

1435“Hawk-weed,” from the Greekἱέραξ, “a hawk.” Under this name are included, Fée thinks, the varieties of the genus Crepis.

1436Apuleius, Metam. c. 30, says this of the eagle, when preparing to soar aloft.

1437This is in some degree true of the juices of the wild lettuces, in a medicinal point of view; but it must be remembered that he has enumerated the Isatis among them, which in reality has no milky juice at all.

1438“Lactucarium,” or the inspissated milky juice of the garden lettuce, is still used occasionally as a substitute for opium, having slightly anodyne properties, but, as Fée remarks, all that Pliny says here of its effects is erroneous.

1439“Adustiones;” “burns,” perhaps.

1440A kind of spider. See B. xi. cc. 24, 28, 29.

1441This is consistent with modern experience, as to the medicinal effects of the cultivated plants in general.

1442In B. xix. c. 38.

1443The lettuce is not a purgative, nor has it the property here ascribed to it, of making blood.

1444Sillig is probably correct in his belief that there is a lacuna here.

1445“Oxypori.”

1446“Ad intinctum aceti.”

1447In B. xix. c. 38; the “opium” or “poppy lettuce,” the Lactuca silvestris of modern botany, the soporific properties of which are superior to those of the cultivated kinds.

1448Or southern-wood. See B. xxi. c.34.

1449See B. xxxi. cc. 11 and 12.

1450There are few plants, Fée says, which are so utterly destitute of all remedial properties as the beet. See B. xix. c.40.

1451Fée says that the leaves of beet are not at all efficacious except as applications for inflammations of the body.

1452Dioscorides merely says that the leaves of the limonion are similar to those of beet, but he does not state that itisa kind of wild beet.

1453Dioscorides says “ten or more.”

1454Fée is inclined to identify the “limonium,” or “meadow-plant,” with the Statice limonium of Linnæus; but looks upon its identification as very doubtful. Fuchs, Tragus, and Lonicerus, have identified it with the Pyrola rotundifolia; but that is not a meadow plant, it growing only in the woods. Others, again, have suggested the Senecio doria, or “water trefoil.”

1455Divided by naturalists into wild chicory or endive, the Cichorium intybus of Linnæus, and cultivated endive, the Cichorium endivia of Linnæus. The name “endive” comes from the Arabian “hindeb;” but whether that was derived from the Latin “intubum,” or vice versâ, is uncertain. The two kinds above mentioned, are subdivided, Fée says, into two varieties, the cultivated and the wild. See B. xix. c.39.

1456The foundation of the Greek name,κιχώριον, and the Arabic “Schikhrieh.”

1457The medicinal properties of endive vary, according as it is employed wild or cultivated, and according to the part employed. The leaves are more bitter than the stalk, but not so much so as the root. The juice of all the varieties is very similar, probably, to that of the lettuce; but, as Fée says, little use has been made of it in modern times.

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