Gentiana, Gentian; the root is sufficiently efficacious in subtilising and cleansing, and as a detergent and deobstruent medicine.
Commentary. Dioscorides states that the gentian (Gentiana lutea?) has a heating and astringent faculty; that it is a remedy in cases of persons bitten by venomous animals, with pepper and rue; that it is useful in hepatic and stomachic affections; that it procures abortion when applied in a collyrium; that it is a vulnerary herb, and is used for many ulcers and other cutaneous affections. (iii, 3.) Galen justly remarks that it owes its attenuant and deobstruent powers to its being intensely bitter. (De Simpl. v.) Apuleius, like Dioscorides, recommends it as an application for the bites of serpents. Hence it always obtained a place in the Theriac. See Celsus (v, 23.) Serapion says it is the best of all remedies in cases of hydrophobia, and this character it has obtained in modern times. Avicenna gives a very circumstantial account of it, enumerating all its virtues as stated by the Greek authorities, namely, its abstergent, attenuant, deobstruent, diuretic, and emmenagogue powers, and recommends it particularly as an application to parts stung by venomous animals. (ii, 2, 281.) Ebn Baithar gives very interesting extracts from Arabian authorities on this head. (i, 260.) It is found in the Hippocratic collection. In the modern Greek Pharmacopœia it is stated that the G. lutea grows in the Alps of Switzerland. This would seem to imply that it is not a native of Greece.
Γεράνιον,
Geranium, Cranebill; that species, the leaves of which resemble those of the Anemone, and has edible roots, when drunk with wine to the amount of a drachm, removes inflation of the uterus. The other species is of no use in medicine.
Commentary. Dioscorides and the other ancient authorities describe only two species of the Geranium, the former of which would certainly seem to be the tuberosum, and the other the rotundifolium. They were not acquainted with the Geranium Robertianum. Dioscorides merely says of the geranium that when drunk in wine, to the amount of a drachm, it cures inflation of the womb (iii, 121.) Few of the other authorities notice it. See Ebn Baithar (i, 10.) The geraniums held a place in our English Dispensatory until a recent period. See Quincy (p. 88.)
Γῆ,
Terra, Earth; all kinds are desiccants; that which is unmixed with any other substance is also free of pungency; but if any fiery quality is mixed with it, it lays the same aside when washed. The fatty part, then, of wrought earth is an useful application to all organs that require drying; they use therefore the clay of Egyptian earth to dropsical and splenitic affections, and to soft swellings, with manifest advantage. Of medicinal earths, the Lemnia rubrica, or Sigillum, as it is called, in addition to its being moderately desiccative and astringent, proves an antidote to deleterious medicines, cures malignant ulcers with wine or vinegar, stops all kinds of hemorrhage, and removes dysentery and spreading ulcers of the intestines, the gut being first washed out by an injection of honied water, and then of brine. The Rubrica Sinopica, or vermilion, being stronger than the Lemnian, is used as an ingredient in plasters, and when drunk it kills worms. The Samian is much more emollient than the Lemnian, as being glutinous and viscid. It is to be used then in all cases in which emollients are indicated; but it also cures spitting of blood from whatever part it proceed. The Selenusian and the Chian are more detergent, and are therefore used by some women in the cleansing applications to their faces. It also produces the incarnation and cicatrization of ulcers, more especially of burns. The unwashed Cimolian is possessed of mixed powers, being refrigerant and discutient; but the washed is more cooling, and cures burns with oxycrate. The Terra Ampelitis (it is the kind of earth which is rubbed upon vines to destroy the worms which breed in them) is powerfully desiccant and discutient, but not without pungency. The Cretan is full of air and detergent, without pungency. The Eretrian is decidedly astringent, but when burnt and washed it is desiccant without pungency; but the cineritious is preferable. The Pnigitis has powers resembling the Cimolian, but is black. The Armenian, called also Bole, is powerfully desiccative, and therefore agrees excellently with dysenteric cases, fluxes of the belly, spitting of blood, consumption, dyspnœa from humidity, humid ulcers, and pestilential affections. It is drunk with a thin diluted wine, or, if fever be present, with water. The Alanabolus is possessed of similar powers to the Armenian. Ochre is discutient and septic in its powers; it therefore restrains the fungous flesh of ulcers, and fills hollow ones when mixed with cerate.
Commentary. We shall now give a brief explanation of the medicinal earths of the ancients, and for a fuller account of them we would beg to refer to the Appendix to Dunbar’s ‘English and Greek Lexicon,’ to Hill’s ‘Annotations on Theophrastus on Stones,’ and to Sprengel’s ‘Notes on Dioscorides.’ Of the ancient writers, Dioscorides and Galen give the fullest account of them. The Arabians, also, especially Rhases, Avicenna, and Serapion, treat of them in the most ample manner, but supply little additional information. Geoffroy says of the Lemnian earth, that it is “a fat, viscid, slippery clay, of a pale red colour.” The Lemnian ruddle (μίλτος) was the red Armenian bole, consisting of silex, alumine, oxyd of iron, &c. The Lemnium Sigillum was the Lemnian earth, made into cakes and stamped with a seal, as a guarantee of its purity. The Cretan earth is white chalk. The Samian earth, as Sprengel states, appears to have been pure argil; Kidd supposes it to have been pipeclay. The kind called aster was globose and thick. The Chian, Selenusian, and Pnigitid earths, are also argils, more or less pure. The Sinopic ruddle was a compact kind of ochre or marl, nearly resembling the Lemnian earth. Pliny ranks the Cimolian earth among the chalks or clays (cretæ.) Sprengel and Kidd suppose it an argil. The purple Cimolian earth of the ancients was our steatitis or soap-rock. From Dioscorides’s account of the Melian earth, it appears to have consisted principally of alum, and was different from the Terra Melia of Theophrastus. The Ampelites would seem to have been a bituminous earth, formed from stone-coal, probably resembling cannel coal. The Armenian earth, as Matthiolus remarks, was different from the Armenian bole now brought from the East. The ancient is described to be a very dry clay, having the appearance of stone, and very triturable, like lime. It was much celebrated as a remedy for the plague. See Galen, Aëtius, and Serapion. It was introduced into practice by Galen. It is clear, as Dr. Hill remarks, that it was the yellow Armenian bole which Galen used; the red being first used by the Arabians. Dr. Hill found it an excellent astringent and absorbent. The Eretrian earth was an impure argil, of a snow-white colour. Geber makes frequent mention of magnesia.