Scribonius Largus puts the true meaning of the phrase beyond doubt. He directs us, after the application of caustic to haemorrhoids, to endeavour to get them to fall off by the back of an ear scoop, which part the Greeks called the spoon (‘auriscalpio averso quam partem κυαθίσκον Graeci vocant’).
Marcellus copies this passage from Scribonius, but alters it. He says: ‘de specilli latitudine illinendae sunt’ (xxxi. 6, p. 329).
I shall now proceed to give a few instances of this use of the back of the scoop in minor surgical manipulations.
In ancyloblepharon Celsus says the eyelids are to be separated with the back of the scoop.
Igitur aversum specillum inserendum, diducendaeque eo palpebrae sunt (VII. vii. 6).
The back of the scoop was used as a retractor for delicate structures. In radical cure of hernia Celsus directs us to keep the bowel from prolapsing by means of it:
‘For if the piece be small it is to be pushed back over the groin into the abdomen, either with the finger or the back of the specillum.’
Nam quod parvulum est super inguen in uterum vel digito vel averso specillo repellendum est (VII. xxi).
In the cure of varicocele it is used to replace the veins in position:
Tum venae, quaecunque protractae sunt, in ipsum inguen averso specillo compelli debent (VII. xxii).