The Greek and Latin doctors make no allusion to silver as a medicine, and the earliest evidence of its actual employment as a remedy is found in the writings of Avicenna, who gave it in the metallic state “in tremore cordis, in fœtore oris.” He is also believed to have introduced the practice of silvering pills with the intention of thereby adding to their efficacy. To John Damascenus, a Christian saint who lived among the Arabs before Avicenna, is attributed the remark concerning silver, “Remedium adhibitum est, et in omnibus itaque capitis morbis, ob Lunæ, Argenti, et Cerebri sympathicam trinitatem.” This association of the moon, silver, and the brain was believed in firmly by the chemical doctors of the sixteenth century, and for a long time a tincture of the moon, tinctura Lunæ, was the most famous remedy in epilepsy and melancholia. A great many high authorities, among them Boyle, Boerhaave, and Hoffmann in the eighteenth century, continued to prescribe this tincture or the lunar pills, but silver gradually dropped out of fashion. A great number of medical investigators since have from time to time recommended the nitrate or the chloride of silver in various diseases, but without succeeding in securing for silver a permanent reputation as an internal medicine.
The Pilulæ Lunares were generally composed of nitrate of silver combined with opium, musk, and camphor. Nitrate of silver was given in doses varying from a twentieth to a tenth of a grain. The tincture of the moon was a solution of nitrate of silver with some copper, which gave it a blue tint and probably was the active medicinal ingredient. Fused nitrate of silver or lunar caustic seems to have succeeded to the reputation of fused caustic potash as a cautery, and also to have acquired the name of lapis infernalis (sometimes translated “hell-stone” in old books) originally applied to the fused potash.
The only reason assigned for this title is the keen pain caused by the application of the caustic, though probably it was first adopted to contrast it with the lapis divinus, which was a combination of sulphate of copper and alum used as an application to the eyes.
Christopher Glaser, pharmacien at the court of Louis XIV, who subsequently had to leave France on suspicion of being implicated in the Brinvilliers poisonings, was the first to make nitrate of silver in sticks.
TIN.
Tin came into medical use in the middle ages, and acquired its position particularly as a vermifuge. For this purpose tin had a reputation only second to mercury. Several compounds of this metal were popular as medicines both official and as nostrums in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and tin did not drop out of medicinal employment until early in the nineteenth century.
The beautiful mosaic gold (aurum musivum), a pet product with many alchemists, was probably the first tin compound to be used in medicine. It was made by first combining tin and mercury into an amalgam, and then distilling this substance with sulphur and sal ammoniac. It is now known to be a bisulphide of tin. The mercury only facilitates the combination of the tin and the sulphur, and the sal ammoniac has the effect of regularising the temperature in the process. The product is a beautiful golden metal of crystalline structure and brilliant lustre. It was given in doses of from 4 to 20 grains; was sudorific and purgative; and was recommended in fevers, hysterical complaints, and venereal disorders. The subsequent preparations of tin which came to be used principally as vermifuges were the Calx Jovis (the binoxide), the sal Jovis (sometimes the nitrate and sometimes the chloride), and the Amalgama Jovis. These, however, were all ultimately superseded by the simple powder of tin given either with chalk, sugar, crabs’ eyes, or combined with honey or some conserve. The dose was very various with different practitioners. Some prescribed only a few grains, others gave up to a drachm, and Dr. Alston, an eminent Edinburgh physician in the eighteenth century, said its success depended on being administered in much larger doses. He recommended an ounce with 4 ounces of treacle to be given on an empty stomach. To be followed next day with ½ oz., and another ½ oz. the day after; the course to be wound up by a cathartic.
The Anti-hecticum Poterii was a combination of tin with iron and antimony, to which nitrate of potash was added. It was sudorific and was thought to be especially useful in the sweats of consumption and blood spitting. Flake’s Anti-hæmorrhoidal Ointment was an amalgam of tin made into an ointment with rose ointment, to which some red precipitate was added. Brugnatelli’s Poudre Vermifuge was a sulphide of tin. Spielman’s Vermifuge Electuary was simply tin filings and honey.
Oxide of tin is the basis of certain applications for the finger nails. As supplied by perfumers the pure oxide is coloured with carmine and perfumed with lavender. Piesse says pure oxide of tin is similarly used to polish tortoiseshell.