Σμίλαξ,
Smilax or Taxus, the Yew, is a tree of deleterious properties.
Commentary. It is the Taxus baccata, L. See [Book V. (48.)] It appears remarkable that Dioscorides should have allowed this article a place in the Materia Medica, seeing that he himself says that he had noticed it merely to guard against it. He says that in Narbonia (Languedoc or Savoy), the yew-tree was possessed of such a power as to prove fatal to persons sitting or sleeping in its shade. (ii, 80.) We have stated, however, elsewhere ([v, 48]) that great difference of opinion has prevailed regarding this reputed noxious power of the yew.
Σμύρνα,
Myrrha, Myrrh, is of the second order of calefacients and desiccants. It, therefore, agglutinates wounds of the head when sprinkled upon them. It has also some bitterness; and hence it kills worms and the fœtus; and it is detergent, and, therefore, is mixed with ophthalmic remedies. It is likewise expectorant without roughening the trachea. Bœotian myrrh has calefacient, emollient, and solvent powers.
Commentary. That this is the same as our myrrh is indisputable, and the best botanical authorities are now pretty well agreed that it is the product of a dwarf shrub, to which they have given the name of Balsamodendron Myrrha. See Lindley (Veg. Kingd. 460); Pereira (Mat. Med. 1187.) It is mentioned in what is perhaps the oldest literary production in existence (Genesis xxxvii, 25), and is frequently noticed as a medicine in the works which bear the name of Hippocrates. (De Superfœt.; de Muliebr.) See further ‘Œconom. Hippocrat.’ (347) and Dierbach (Arsn. des Hipp. 224.) In short, this gum-resin was much used in the ancient practice of medicine. According to Dioscorides it is calefacient, soporific, agglutinative, desiccative, and astringent. He recommends it in chronic coughs and asperities of the trachea. He also states that it was used in ulcers of the eye and other complaints of a like nature. He further says of it that it is anthelminthic; that it cures fetor of the mouth, and likewise of the armpits when used as an ointment with liquid alum; that in a gargle with oil it strengthens the gums and teeth. He describes two kinds of liquid myrrh, which he calls Stacte; the finest was that which runs fluid from the tree without cutting. The other was a fluid myrrh, taken out of the midst of the larger pieces of the solid kind. See Hill (Mat. Med.) The account which Pliny gives of myrrh is highly interesting, but does not contain much that would answer our present purpose. (See H. N. xii, 33-6.) Celsus makes mention of the stacte (v, 23), and prescribes the myrrh frequently as a concocting and agglutinating substance. Galen describes it in two of his works. (De Simpl. 109, and De Antidot. T. ii, 433, ed. Basil.) Our author’s account of this substance is condensed from the former of these works. Aëtius in like manner borrows from him, as Oribasius does from Dioscorides. For the Arabians, see Avicenna (ii, 2, 468); Rhases (Cont. l. ult. i, 474); Averrhoes (Collig. v, 42); Serapion (De Simpl. 292); Haly Abbas (Pract. ii, 41); Ebn Baithar (ii, 496.) Our limits prevent us from venturing upon an exposition of what these authors have written upon this subject, but this is the less to be regretted, as we do not find that they add anything of much practical importance to the information supplied by their Grecian masters. They confirm, however, by their authority, all that the Greeks had stated regarding the virtues of myrrh as an emmenagogue and a medicine capable of accelerating delivery. They are also agreed that it is diuretic and expectorant. One of Serapion’s authorities says it evacuates fluids from the belly when applied as a plaster. Another of them says that in a masticatory it evacuates the brain.
It would appear that the Bœotian myrrh mentioned by Dioscorides, Galen, and our author, was the Alexanders or Smyrnium Olusatrum.
Σμύρνιον,
Smyrnium, Alsander (called also Hipposelinum and Apium silvestre) is heating and desiccative of the third order, being stronger than parsley, but weaker than stone-parsley. It is, therefore, emmenagogue and diuretic.