ASAFCETIDA 



22. The riddles of asafoetida begin with the very name: there is no 

 adequate explanation of our word asa or assa. The new Oxford English 

 Dictionary ventures to derive it from Persian aza or aza. This word, 

 however, means nothing but "mastic," a product entirely different 

 from what we understand by asafoetida (p. 2 5 2) . In no Oriental language 

 is there a word of the type asa or aza with reference to this product, so 

 it could not have been handed on to Europe by an Oriental nation. 

 Kaempfer, who in 1687 studied the plant in Laristan, and was fairly 

 familiar with Persian, said that he was ignorant of the origin of the 

 European name. 1 Littr£, the renowned author of the Dictionnaire 

 francais, admits that the origin of asa is unknown, and wisely abstains 

 from any theory. 2 The supposition has been advanced that asa was 

 developed from the laser or laserpitium of Pliny (xix, 5), the latter 

 having thus been mutilated by the druggists of the middle ages. 

 This etymology, first given by Garcia da Orta, 8 has been indorsed 

 by E. Borszczow, 4 a Polish botanist, to whom we owe an excellent 

 investigation of the asa-furnishing plants. Although this explanation 

 remains as yet unsatisfactory, as the alleged development from laser 

 to asa is merely inferred, but cannot actually be proved from mediaeval 

 documents, 6 it is better, at any rate, than the derivation from the 

 Persian. 



Asafoetida is a vegetable product consisting of resin, gum, and 

 essential oil in varying proportions, the resin generally amounting 

 to more than one-half, derived from different umbelliferous plants, as 

 Ferula narthex, alliacea, f&tida, persica, and scorodosma (or Scorodosma 



1 Amoenitates exoticae, p. 539. 



2 The suggestion has also been made that asa may be derived from Greek 

 asi (?) ("disgust") or from Persian anguza (" asaf cetida ") ; thus at least it is said by 

 F. Stuhlmann (Beitrage zur Kulturgeschichte Ostafrikas, p. 609). Neither is con- 

 vincing. The former moves on the same high level as Li Si-cen's explanation of 

 a-wei ("The barbarians call out a, expressing by this exclamation their horror at 

 the abominable odor of this resin"). 



3 C. Markham, Colloquies, p. 41. John Parkinson (Theatrum botanicum, 

 p. 1569, London, 1640) says, "There is none of the ancient Authours either Greeke, 

 Latine, or Arabian, that hath made any mention of Asa, either dulcis or f cetida, 

 but was first depraved by the Druggists and Apothecaries in forraigne parts, that in 

 stead of Laser said Asa, from whence ever since the name of Asa hath continued." 



4 Mimoires de VAcad. de St. Pttersbourg, Vol. Ill, No. 8, i860, p. 4. 



5 DuCange does not even list the word "asafoetida." 



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