A small variety of the blunt hook is mentioned by Celsus, Galen, and Paul.
Of the extraction of foreign bodies from the ear Celsus says:
Sin aliquid exanime est, specillo oriculario protrahendum est, aut hamulo retuso paulum recurvato (VI. vii).
Paul says that if stones of fruits, &c. fall into the ear they must be extracted with an ear scoop, a hook, or a forceps.
Both types of blunt hook are represented by extant specimens; see [Pl. XXIII, figs. 3, 4]. These remind us of our aneurism needles, and it is interesting to note that Galen (ut supra) speaks of an ‘eyed hook’. The instruments shown in [Pl. XXIII, figs. 2, 4] we might look on either as curved retractors or dissectors as they are half sharp. [Pl. XXV, fig. 2] shows a hook of crotchet-hook type combined with a scoop. It is from Herculaneum.
The Strigil.
Greek, ξύστρα. Latin, strigil.
It seems to have been a common method of applying remedies to the auditory canal to warm them in a strigil and pour them in with it. Galen frequently mentions this. In Med. Sec. Loc. (xii. 622) he says:
Having warmed the fat of a squirrel in a strigil, instil it.
Celsus (VI. vii. l) says: