50 ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE BOTANY OF [ Ranunculaceae. 
some other plant. The term Nirdisi, as observed by Mr. Colebrooke, implies that the 
drug is used as an antidote to poison, being composed of the privative preposition nir 
and bis, poison; and in the Mukhzun ool Adwieh, it is further explained, as repelling 
from and purifying the body from deadly poisons. It may therefore be considered as a 
medicine of considerable importance’ in Eastern countries, and that it is not only so at 
present, but has been reckoned such from very ancient records, will appear from the 
following quotations. The Arabic synonyme Zudwar, leads us at once to the accounts 
of the Zedoaria of old authors, and the Geidwar of Avicenna. Thus, Mathiolus 
(Commentaries on Dioscorides, lib. ii. c. 154), tells us, ‘‘ Zedoaria (ut cap. clxxii. testis est 
” 
Serapio) convehitur e Sinarum regione ultra extremas | Indie oras;” adding, after 
giving the medical properties, ‘‘ etin antidotis additur. Ideoque dixit Avicenna nihil 
esse ea preestantius ad ebibitum Napellum.” Garcias ab Orta, who was for so many years 
one of the physicians at Goa, writes: ‘‘ Quod nos hic Zedoariam appellamus, Avicenne, 
lib. ii. cap. 734, Geiduar dicitur ; aliud nomen ignoro, quia nascitur regionibus Sinen- — 
sium provincie vicinis. Magno vero emitur Geidwar; nec facile invenias, nisi apud 
circumforaneos quosdam et circulatores, quos Indi jogwes, Mauretani Calandares 
appellent, hominum genus quod peregrinationibus et stipem amendicando vitam sustentat. 
Ab his enim et reges et magnates Geiduar emunt.” ‘ Utile est autem istud Geiduar ad 
plurima, sed presertim adversus venena, et virulentorum animalium ictus morsusque.” 
Clusius, at p. 378 of the same work, ‘‘ Exoticorum libri decem” having obtained some 
specimens, ‘‘ Gedwar veri nomine inscriptas,” gives a figure, and compares them with 
the roots of Anthora, which was at onetime thought to be the Zedoary ; they resemble a 
good deal those of atees, as represented in pl. 13. The Persian authors, after giving 
the synonymes, mention that there are five kinds of Judwar. The best, called Khutai, 
or Chinese, procured from the mountains of that country. The two next kinds are the 
produce of the mountains of Tibet, of Nepal, of Morung, and Rungpore ; the fourth kind 
is from the hills of the Dukhun; and the fifth, called Antuleh, is the produce of Andaloosee, 
or Spain. A long account follows of the properties and uses of Judwar, of which it is 
needless to adduce more than that it is considered a powerful antidote to poison, par- 
ticularly of the dish; more so, indeed, than the tiryak farook, the ingredients of which are 
given by Prosper Alpinus De Medicin. A’gypt. lib. iv. c. 9. It is_therefore probable, 
that the Mrdisi is the true Zedoary or Geiduar of Avicenna, whatever may be the plant 
which produces it ; that itis not likely to have been what is now so called, the produce 
of a species of Curcuma, is evident from the difficulty which Garcias ab Orta had in 
procuring it even in India, Further, if the descriptions in the Persian works on Materia 
Medica be compared with those of the old Arabian authors, they will be found to refer 
to the same article, of which in India the name is Nirdisi. It may therefore be recom- 
mended as an interesting subject of inquiry for travellers in the Himalayas from Silhet 
to Cashmere, to ascertain the plant or plants which furnish the different kinds of Nirbisi, 
Judwar, Zudwar, or Antuleh.. Cissampelos convolvulacea is called dukh ‘Mnirbisee in the 
N.W. provinces, 
Synopsis 
