Pliny recommends the ashes of hart’s horn for tænia. (H. N. xxviii, 59.)
Dioscorides ascribes anthelminthic properties to various acrid and bitter substances, such as garlic, cresses, fern, gith, mulberry, pomegranate rind, lupine, cabbage, nettle, hyssop, mint, calamint, wormwood, wormseed, rue, coriander, thyme, &c. Similar remedies are recommended in the ‘Euporista,’ which is falsely ascribed to him.
Galen mentions that bitters in general are destructive of intestinal worms. The teres, he adds, is killed by the absinthium; but the latus and ascaris require stronger medicines, such as the filix. The author of the ‘Isagoge,’ a work generally ascribed to Galen, divides intestinal worms into the broad, the round, and the ascarides. The round are about the length of a span or somewhat more, especially such as are formed about the stomach. The ascarides are short, and form in the rectum. The broad, called also fasciæ or tæniæ, from their resemblance to tape, are said to be sometimes the length of the intestines. The round are most common in children, the ascarides before manhood; and these are difficult to remove except by bitters, elecampane, and acrid food.
Oribasius treats briefly of lumbrici, recommending for the l. rotundus, southernwood, wormwood, calamint, gith, &c., taken internally or applied outwardly; for ascarides, the juice of calamint, and cedar rosin, in like manner; and for the tænia the bark of the root of mulberry, and the roots of fern in honied water, and also the root of the white chamæleon and costus.
Aëtius gives a full and accurate detail of the symptoms and treatment of lumbrici, but as his remedies are much the same as our author’s, it will be unnecessary to deliver any account of them. He remarks, that anthelminthics either kill worms by their acrimony, or remove them by their bitterness, or irritate them so as to expel them, or by lubricating the parts facilitate the expulsion of them.
Actuarius gives a sensible account of the formation of worms, which he ascribes to putrefaction or indigestion. White worms, he says, are the product of indigestion, but the red, and those of any other colour, arise from putrefaction.
Nonnus merely abridges our author’s account of this subject.
The ingredients in the compositions recommended by Myrepsus, are such as aloes, scammony, southernwood, and bitter almonds.
Octavius Horatianus gives a good account of worms, but it contains scarcely anything that is not to be found in our author’s. He says, that from long experience he had great confidence in a purgative draught consisting of scammony, the ashes of burnt peas, euphorbium, and nitre, given in sweet wine. But garlic, and other acrid things, are to be first eaten.
The Epistle of Alexander Trallian on worms, first published by Hieronymus Mercurialis, and afterwards by Albertus Fabricius, and again lately by Ideler, contains an interesting exposition of the ancient views on this subject. He divides intestinal worms into three genera: the ascaris, the strongylus or round, and the latus or broad. He remarks that the small worms (ascarides) are generally found in the large intestines, the round in the small intestines, and hence they are often vomited up; while the broad worms (tænia) are sometimes as long as the intestines, some having been discharged sixteen feet in length. He states that they are engendered by corruption of the food, and putrefaction of crude humours. He lays down at great length the plan of treatment, which he varies according as they are with or without fever. His remedies consist of cathartic, acrid, oily, acid, and bitter substances. Of purgatives he mentions aloes, scammony, and hellebore; of acrid articles, garlic, cresses, and the like; of oily medicines, the oil of roses, castor oil (oleum ricini), and common oil boiled with rue; of acids, salt and nitre (soda); and of bitters, southernwood, wormwood, hyssop, fennel, and the like. For the expulsion of the strongylus he speaks favorably of a decoction of gagate stone (jet). For ascarides and lumbrici he recommends a lavement prepared from juniper. He concludes his treatise by stating that “ten thousand” other things had been recommended as anthelminthics by the ancients.