Detailed table of contents
CHAP. 10.
REMEDIES DERIVED FROM THE HUMAN BLOOD, THE SEXUAL CONGRESS, ETC.
The blood of the human body, come from what part it may, is most efficacious, according to Orpheus and Archelaiis, as an application for quinzy: they say, too, that if it is applied to the mouth of a person who has fallen down in a fit of epilepsy, he will come to himself immediately. Some say that, for epilepsy, the great toes should be pricked, and the drops of blood that exude therefrom applied to the face; or else, that a virgin should touch the patient with her right thumb — a cir- cumstance that has led to the belief that persons suffering from epilepsy should eat the flesh of animals in a virgin state. Æschines of Athens used to cure quinzy, carcinoma, and affec- tions of the tonsillary glands and uvula, with the ashes of burnt excrements, a medicament to which he gave the name of “botryon.” There are many kinds of diseases which disappear entirely after the first sexual congress, or, in the case of females, at the first appearance of menstruation; indeed, if such is not the case, they are apt to become chronic, epilepsy in particular. Even more than this-a man, it is said, who has been stung by a serpent or scorpion, experiences relief from the sexual congress; but the woman, on the other hand, is sensible of detriment. We are assured, too, that if persons, when washing their feet, touch the eyes three times with the water, they will never be subject to ophthalmia or other diseases of the eyes.
Detailed table of contents
CHAP. 11.
REMEDIES DERIVED FROM THE DEAD.
Scrofula, imposthumes of the parotid glands, and throat diseases, they say, may be cured by the contact of the hand of a person who has been carried off. by an early death: indeed there are some who assert that any dead body will produce the same effect, provided it is of the same sex as the patient, and that the part affected is touched with the back of the left hand. To bite off a piece from wood that has been struck by lightning, the hands being held behind the back, and then to apply it to the tooth, is a sure remedy, they say, for toothache. Some persons recommend the tooth to be fumigated with the smoke of a burnt tooth, which has belonged to another person of the same sex; or else to attach to the person a dogtooth, as it is called, which has been extracted from a body before burial. Earth, they say, taken from out of a human skull, acts as a depilatory to the eyelashes; it is asserted, also, that any plant which may happen to have grown there, if chewed, will cause the teeth to come out; and that if a circle is traced round an ulcer with a human bone, it will be effectually prevented from spreading.
Some persons, again, mix water in equal proportions from three different wells, and, after making a libation with part of it in a new earthen vessel, administer the rest to patients suffering from tertian fever, when the paroxysms come on. So, too, in cases of quartan fever, they take a fragment of a nail from a cross, or else a piece of a halter that has been used for crucifixion, and, after wrapping it in wool, attach it to the patient’s neck; taking care, the moment he has recovered, to conceal it in some hole to which the light of the sun cannot penetrate.
Detailed table of contents
CHAP. 12.
VARIOUS REVERIES AND DEVICES OF THE MAGICIANS.
The following are some of the reveries of magic. A whetstone upon which iron tools have been frequently sharpened, if put, without his being aware of it, beneath the pillow of a person sinking under the effects of poison, will make him give evidence and declare what poison has been administered, and at what time and place, though at the same time he will not disclose the author of the crime. When a person has been struck by lightning, if the body is turned upon the side which has sustained the injury, he will instantly recover the power of speech — that is quite certain. For the cure of inguinal tumours, some persons take the thrum of an old web, and after tying seven or nine knots in it, mentioning at each knot the name of some widow woman or other, attach it to the part affected. To assuage the pain of a wound, they recommend the party to take a nail or any other substance that has been trodden under foot, and to wear it, attached to the body with the thrum of a web. To get rid of warts, some lie in a footpath with the face upwards, when the moon is twenty days old at least, and after fixing their gaze upon it, extend their arms above the head, and rub themselves with anything within their reach. If a person is extracting a corn at the moment that a star shoots, he will experience an immediate cure, they say. By pouring vinegar upon the hinges of a door, a thick liniment is formed, which, applied to the forehead, will alleviate headache: an effect equally produced, we are told, by binding the temples with a halter with which a man has been hanged. When a fish-bone happens to stick in the throat, it will go down immediately, if the person plunges his feet into cold water; but where the accident has happened with any other kind of bone, the proper remedy is to apply to the head some fragments of bones taken from the same dish. In cases where bread has stuck in the throat, the best plan is to take some of the same bread, and insert it in both ears.
Detailed table of contents
CHAP. 13.
REMEDIES DERIVED FROM THE HUMAN EXCRETIONS.
In Greece, where everything is turned to account, the owners of the gymnasia have introduced the very excretions even of the human body among the most efficient remedies; so much so, indeed, that the scrapings from the bodies of the athletes are looked upon as possessed of certain properties of an emollient, calorific, resolvent, and expletive nature, resulting from the compound of human sweat and oil. These scrapings are used, in the form of a pessary, for inflammations and contractions of the uterus: similarly employed, they act as an emmenagogue, and are useful for reducing condylomata and inflammations of the rectum, as also for assuaging pains in the sinews, sprains, and nodosities of the joints. The scrapings obtained from the baths are still more efficacious for these purposes, and hence it is that they form an ingredient in maturative preparations. Such scrapings as are impregnated with wrestlers’ oil, used in combination with mud, have a mollifying effect upon the joints, and are more particularly efficacious as a calorific and resolvent; but in other respects their properties are not so strongly developed.
The shameless and disgusting researches that have been made will quite transcend all belief, when we find authors of the very highest repute proclaiming aloud that the male seminal fluid is a sovereign remedy for the sting of the scorpion! In the case too, of women afflicted with sterility, they recommend the application of a pessary, made of the first excrement that is voided by an infant at the moment of its birth; the name they give it is “meconium.” They have even gone so far, too, as to scrape the very filth from off the walls of the gymnasia, and to assert that this is also possessed of certain calorific properties. These scrapings are used as a resolvent for inflamed tumours, and are applied topically to ulcers upon aged people and children, and to excoriations and burns.
Detailed table of contents
CHAP. 14.
REMEDIES DEPENDING UPON THE HUMAN WILL.
It would be the less becoming then for me to omit all mention of the remedies which depend upon the human will. Total abstinence from food or drink, or from wine only, from flesh, or from the use of the bath, in cases where the health requires any of these expedients, is looked upon as one of the most effectual modes of treating diseases. To this class of remedies must be added bodily exercise, exertion of the voice, anointings, and frictions according to a prescribed method: for powerful friction, it should be remembered, has a binding effect upon the body, while gentle friction, on the other hand, acts as a laxative; so too, repeated friction reduces the body, while used in moderation it has a tendency to make flesh. But the most beneficial practice of all is to take walking or carriage exercise; this last being performed in various ways. Exercise on horseback is extremely good for affections of the stomach and hips, a voyage for phthisis, and a change of locality for diseases of long standing. So, too, a cure may sometimes be effected by sleep, by a recumbent position in bed, or by the use of emetics in mod
eration. To lie upon the back is beneficial to the sight, to lie with the face downwards is good for a cough, and to lie on the side is recommended for patients suffering from catarrh.
According to Aristotle and Fabianus, it is towards spring and autumn that we are most apt to dream; and they tell us that persons are most liable to do so when lying on the back, but never when lying with the face downwards. Theophrastus assures us that the digestion is accelerated by lying on the right side; while, on the other hand, it is retarded by lying with the face upwards. The most powerful, however, of all remedies, and one which is always at a person’s own command, is the sun: violent friction, too, is useful by the agency of linen towels and body-scrapers. To pour warm water on the head before taking the vapour-bath, and cold water after it, is looked upon as a most beneficial practice; so, too, is the habit of taking cold water before food, of drinking it every now and then while eating, of taking it just before going to sleep, and, if practicable, of waking every now and then, and taking a draught. It is worthy also of remark, that there is no living creature but man that is fond of hot drinks, a proof that they are contrary to nature. It has been ascertained by experiment, that it is a good plan to rinse the mouth with undiluted wine, before going to sleep, for the purpose of sweetening the breath; to rinse the mouth with cold water an odd number of times every morning, as a preservative against tooth-ache; and to wash the eyes with oxycrate, as a preventive of ophthalmia. It has been remarked also, that the general health is improved by a varying regimen, subject to no fixed rules.
(5.) Hippocrates informs us that the viscera of persons who do not take the morning meal become prematurely aged and feeble; but then he has pronounced this aphorism, it must be remembered, by way of suggesting a healthful regimen, and not to promote gluttony; for moderation in diet is, after all, the thing most conducive to health. L. Lucullus gave charge to one of his slaves to overlook him in this respect; and, a thing that reflected the highest discredit on him, when, now an aged man and laden with triumphs, he was feasting in the Capitol even, his hand had to be removed. from the dish to which he was about to help himself. Surely it was a disgrace for a man to be governed by his own slave more easily than by himself!
Detailed table of contents
CHAP. 15. (6.)
REMEDIES DERIVED FROM SNEEZING.
Sneezing, provoked by a feather, relieves heaviness in the head; it is said too, that to touch the nostrils of a mule with the lips, will arrest sneezing and hiccup. For this last purpose, Varro recommends us to scratch the palm, first of one hand and then of the other; while many say that it is a good plan to shift the ring from off the left hand to the longest finger of the right, and then to plunge the hands into hot water. Theophrastus says, that aged persons sneeze with greater difficulty than others.
Detailed table of contents
CHAP. 16.
REMEDIES DERIVED FROM THE SEXUAL CONGRESS.
Democritus spoke in condemnation of the sexual congress, as being merely an act through which one human being springs from another; and really, by Hercules! the more rarely it is used the better. Still however, athletes, we find, when they become dull and heavy, are re-established by it: the voice, too, is restored by it, when from being perfectly clear, it has degenerated into hoarseness. The congress of the sexes is a cure also for pains in the loins, dimness of the eyesight, alienation of the mental difficulties, and melancholy.
Detailed table of contents
CHAP. 17.
VARIOUS OTHER REMEDIES.
To sit by a pregnant woman, or by a person to whom any remedy is being administered, with the fingers of one hand inserted between those of the other, acts as a magic spell; a discovery that was made, it is said, when Alcmena was delivered of Hercules. If the fingers are thus joined, clasping one or both knees, or if the ham of one leg is first put upon the knee of the other, and then changed about, the omen is of still worse signification. Hence it is, that in councils held by generals and persons in authority, our ancestors forbade these postures, as being an impediment to all business. They have given a similar prohibition also with reference to sacrifices and the offering of public vows; but as to the usage of uncovering the head in presence of the magistrates, that has been enjoined, Varro says, not as a mark of respect, but with a view to health, the head being strengthened by the practice of keeping it uncovered.
When anything has got into the eye, it is a good plan to close the other; and when water has got into the right ear, the person should hop about on the left foot, with the head reclining upon the right shoulder, the reverse being done when the same has happened to the left ear. If the secretion of the phlegm produces coughing, the best way of stopping it is for another person to blow in the party’s face. When the uvula is relaxed, another person should take the patient with his teeth by the crown, and lift him from the ground; while for pains in the neck, the hams should be rubbed, and for pains in the hams the neck. If a person is seized in bed with cramp in the sinews of the legs or thighs, he should set his feet upon the ground: so, too, if he has cramp on the left side, he should take hold of the great toe of the left foot with the right hand, and if on the right side, the great toe of the right foot with the left hand. For cold shiverings or for excessive bleeding at the nostrils, the extremities of the body should be well rubbed with sheep’s wool. To arrest incontinence of urine, the extremities of the generative organs should be tied with a thread of linen or papyrus, and a binding passed round the middle of the thigh. For derangement of the stomach, it is a good plan to press the feet together, or to plunge the hands into hot water.
In addition to all this, in many cases it is found highly beneficial to speak but little; thus, for instance, Mæcenas Melissus, we are told, enjoined silence on himself for three years, in consequence of spitting blood after a convulsive fit. When a person is thrown from a carriage, or when, while mounting an elevation or lying extended at full length, he is menaced with any accident, or if he receives a blow, it is singularly beneficial to hold the breath; a discovery for which we are indebted to an animal, as already stated.
To thrust an iron nail into the spot where a person’s head lay at the moment he was seized with a fit of epilepsy, is said to have the effect of curing him of that disease. For pains in the kidneys, loins, or bladder, it is considered highly soothing to void the urine lying on the face at full length in a reclining bath. It is quite surprising how much more speedily wounds will heal if they are bound up and tied with a Hercules’ knot: indeed, it is said, that if the girdle which we wear every day is tied with a knot of this description, it will be productive of certain beneficial effects, Hercules having been the first to discover the fact.
Demetrius, in the treatise which he has compiled upon the number Four, alleges certain reasons why drink should never be taken in proportions of four cyathi or sextarii. As a preventive of ophthalmia, it is a good plan to rub the parts behind the ears, and, as a cure for watery eyes, to rub the forehead. As to the presages which are derived from man himself, there is one to the effect that so long as a person is able to see himself reflected in the pupil of the patient’s eye, there need be no apprehension of a fatal termination to the malady.
Detailed table of contents
CHAP. 18.
REMEDIES DERIVED FROM THE URINE.
The urine, too, has been the subject not only of numerous theories with authors, but of various religious observances as well, its properties being classified under several distinctive heads: thus, for instance, the urine of eunuchs, they say, is highly beneficial as a promoter of fruitfulness in females. But to turn to those remedies which we may be allowed to name without impropriety — the urine of children who have not arrived at puberty is a sovereign remedy for the poisonous secretions of the asp known as the “ptyas,” from the fact that it spits its venom into the eyes of human beings. It is good, too, for the cure of albugo, films and marks upon the eyes, white specks upon the pupils, and maladies of the eyelids. In combination with meal of fitc
hes, it is used for the cure of burns, and, with a head of bulbed leek, it is boiled down to one half, in a new earthen vessel, for the treatment of suppurations of the ears, or the extermination of worms breeding in those organs: the vapour, too, of this decoction acts as an emmenagogue. Salpe recommends that the eyes should be fomented with it, as a means of strengthening the sight; and that it should be used as a liniment for sun scorches, in combination with white of egg, that of the ostrich being the most effectual, the application being kept on for a couple of hours.
Delphi Complete Works of Pliny the Elder Page 199