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  • A medicine vendor selling antidotes to snake poison. Etching by G.M. Mitelli.
  • A medicine vendor selling antidotes to snake poison. Etching by G.M. Mitelli.
  • People strolling and buying plague antidotes in old St Paul's Cathedral, London. Etching by J. Franklin.
  • A man consuming many antidotes to the plague during the Great Plague of London. Etching by J. Franklin, 1841.
  • A salesman in Rome with a snake selling amulets as antidotes or prophylactics against snake-bite to a crowd of people. Etching by B. Pinelli, 1821.
  • A salesman in Rome with a snake selling amulets as antidotes or prophylactics against snake-bite to a crowd of people. Etching by B. Pinelli, 1821.
  • A salesman in Rome with a snake selling amulets as antidotes or prophylactics against snake-bite to a crowd of people.. Pen drawing by B. Pinelli, 1821.
  • Certaine philosophical preparations of foode and beverage for sea-men, in their long voyages: with some necessary, approoved, and hermeticall medicines and antidotes, fit to be had in readinesse at sea, for prevention or cure of divers diseases / [Sir Hugh Plat].
  • The Christians refuge: or heavenly antidotes against the plague in this time of generall contagion. To which is added the charitable physician, prescribing cheap and absolute remedies, for prevention and cure thereof. Published for the benifit [sic] of all families.
  • The Christians refuge: or heavenly antidotes against the plague in this time of generall contagion. To which is added the charitable physician, prescribing cheap and absolute remedies, for prevention and cure thereof. Published for the benifit [sic] of all families.
  • The Christians refuge: or heavenly antidotes against the plague in this time of generall contagion. To which is added the charitable physician, prescribing cheap and absolute remedies, for prevention and cure thereof. Published for the benifit [sic] of all families.
  • Antidote against poison, in Batak.
  • A Chinese seller of a snake antidote. Drawing by a Chinese artist, ca. 1850.
  • People dancing the tarantella and playing music as an antidote to a tarantula bite. Etching.
  • People dancing the tarantella and playing music as an antidote to a tarantula bite. Etching.
  • Allium moly L., Alliaceae. Golden garlic. Bulbous herb. Distribution: Southwest Europe and Northwest Africa. This is not the 'moly' of Homer's Odyssey Book 10 lines 302-6 which describes Mercury giving Ulysses 'Moly', the antidote to protect himself against Circe's poison ''... The root was black, while the flower was as white as milk
  • Nandina domestica Thunb. Berberidaceae. Heavenly bamboo. Distribution: Asia. It contains cyanogenic glycosides which liberate hydrogen cyanide when damaged. Nothing eats it. Pharmacists have also found a chemical in the sap, called nantenine, which is a potential antidote to poisoning by ecstasy with which it shares the same molecular shape. Photographed in the Medicinal Garden of the Royal College of Physicians, London.
  • Solanum atropurpureum Schrank Solanaceae. Purple Devil. Purple-spined Nightshade. Herbaceous perennial. Distribution: Brazil. This ferociously spined plant contains tropane alkaloids, atropine, hyoscyamine and scopolamine. All are anticholinergic and block the acetylcholine mediated actions of the parasympathetic nervous system. While the alkaloids are used in medicine and as an antidote to anticholinergic nerve gas poisons, the plant itself is not used in medicine. Its sharp spines can be irritant. Photographed in the Medicinal Garden of the Royal College of Physicians, London.
  • Adiantum venustum D.Don Adiantaceae (although placed by some in Pteridaceae). Himalayan maidenhair fern. Small evergreen hardy fern. Distribution: Afghanistan-India. It gains its vernacular name from the wiry black stems that resemble hairs. Adiantum comes from the Greek for 'dry' as the leaflets remain permanently dry. The Cherokee used A. pedatum to make their hair shiny. Henry Lyte (1576), writing on A. capillus-veneris, notes that it restores hair, is an antidote to the bites of mad dogs and venomous beasts
  • Paris quadrifolia L. Trilliaceae Herb Paris Distribution: Europe and temperate Asia. This dramatic plant was known as Herb Paris or one-berry. Because of the shape of the four leaves, resembling a Burgundian cross or a true love-knot, it was also known as Herb True Love. Prosaically, the name ‘Paris’ stems from the Latin ‘pars’ meaning ‘parts’ referring to the four equal leaves, and not to the French capital or the lover of Helen of Troy. Sixteenth century herbalists such as Fuchs, who calls it Aconitum pardalianches which means leopard’s bane, and Lobel who calls it Solanum tetraphyllum, attributed the poisonous properties of Aconitum to it. The latter, called monkshood and wolfsbane, are well known as poisonous garden plants. Gerard (1633), however, reports that Lobel fed it to animals and it did them no harm, and caused the recovery of a dog poisoned deliberately with arsenic and mercury, while another dog, which did not receive Herb Paris, died. It was recommended thereafter as an antidote to poisons. Coles (1657) wrote 'Herb Paris is exceedingly cold, wherupon it is proved to represse the rage and force of any Poyson, Humour , or Inflammation.' Because of its 'cold' property it was good for swellings of 'the Privy parts' (where presumably hot passions were thought to lie), to heal ulcers, cure poisoning, plague, procure sleep (the berries) and cure colic. Through the concept of the Doctrine of Signatures, the black berry represented an eye, so oil distilled from it was known as Anima oculorum, the soul of the eye, and 'effectual for all the disease of the eye'. Linnaeus (1782) listed it as treating 'Convulsions, Mania, Bubones, Pleurisy, Opththalmia', but modern authors report the berry to be toxic. That one poison acted as an antidote to another was a common, if incorrect, belief in the days of herbal medicine. Photographed in the Medicinal Garden of the Royal College of Physicians, London.
  • Asphodeline lutea Rchb. Yellow asphodel, King's spear, Hastula regia. Hardy rhizomatous perennial. Distribution Mediterranean and Caucasus. It is the flower of the dead, as Homer writes that it carpets an area in the gloomy darkness of the underworld (Hades), in Greek mythology where the souls of the dead are found. However this may be a misinterpretation of the Greek where 'Asphodel' has been read instead of 'ash-filled'. In the etymology of flower names, it is suggested that the yellow 'daffodil' is a corruption of French or Flemish 'de asphodel' (both ex Steve Reece, 2007). An Aristotelian epigram, refers to it growing on tombs: 'On my back I hold mallow and many-rooted asphodel ...' The asphodel was sacred to Persephone, goddess of the underworld, who was seized and wed by Hades, god of the underworld, and taken to his kingdom. Her disappearance brings the winter, and her reappearance each year, the spring. The only reliable source of information about its early medical uses is, probably, Dioscorides although the plant in his De Materia Medica may be A. ramosus or A. albus. He gives its properties as diuretic, induces menses, good for coughs and convulsions, an antidote to snake bite, applied as a poultice for sores of all sorts, and in compounds for eye, ear and tooth pains, and to cure alopecia and vitiligo, but induces diarrhoea and vomiting and is an anti-aphrodisiac. Fuchs (1542), as Ruel’s commentaries (1543) note, makes a big mistake as he has Lilium martagon as his concept of A. luteus. Ruel only illustrates its leaves and roots, calling it Hastula regia (Latin for King’s spear) but Matthiolus's Commentaries (1569 edition) has a reasonable woodcut also as Hastula regia (1569). Dodoen's Cruydeboeck (1556) does not mention or illustrate Asphodelus luteus. L'Escluse's French translation Histoire des Plantes (1557) follows the Cruydeboeck. Dodoen's Latin translation Stirpium Historia Pemptades Sex (1583) adds A. luteus with text and woodcut, with no uses. Henry Lyte's (1578) translation illustrates Asphodelus luteus as Asphodeli tertia species and 'Yellow affodyl' (vide etymology of 'daffodil') and also does not describe any uses for it. Gerard's translation The Herbal (1597 and 1633) continues the muddle and does not give any uses for this plant. Parkinson's comments (1640) on the lack of medicinal properties of asphodels, refer to quite different plants coming from wet areas in Lancashire, Scotland and Norway . He calls them pseudoasphodelus major and minor which he writes are called Asphodelus luteus palustris by Dodoens, and not 'King's Spear' which he illustrates with a good woodcut of A. luteus and calls it Asphodelus luteus minor. Once herbals started to be written in northern Europe, the knowledge of the arid loving, Asphodelus luteus of south east Europe was lost. Photographed in the Medicinal Garden of the Royal College of Physicians, London.
  • Cup of Rhinoceros Horn
  • A monkey, dressed in human clothing and holding up a medicinal remedy: representing quacks or itinerant medicine vendors. Lithograph by W. Nichol after J. Watteau.
  • An apothecary publically preparing the drug theriac, under the supervision of a physician. Woodcut.
  • Seventeen different pieces of sealed, precious medicinal earth known as 'terra sigillata'. Pen drawing.
  • Six different pieces of sealed, precious medicinal earth known as 'terra sigillata'. Pen drawing.
  • Two plants, holy thistle (Silybum marianum) and Canada thistle (Cirsium arvense): flowering and fruiting stems. Coloured etching by C. Pierre, c. 1865, after P. Naudin.
  • Theriaca Andromachi
  • Helmet flower (Aconitum anthora L.): flowering stem with separate floral segments and a description of the plant and its uses. Coloured line engraving by C.H.Hemerich, c.1759, after T.Sheldrake.
  • Chinese woodcut, illustrating food poisoning