HISTORY. ME 
tainly be traced to a very remote period. It may be presumed 
that musk has also been in use there for a very long time. 
5. The centuries representing the flowering period of Greek 
and Roman civilization considerably increased the number 
of medicinal substances, not only through such as were obtained 
from the region of the Mediterranean, but also through others 
of Oriental origin. Among these are especially: Amygdale 
dulces, Bulbus Scille, Cantharides, Carice, Castoreum, Cortex 
Granati,' Euphorbium, Fructus Anisi, Fructus Cardamomi,' 
Fructus Feniculi, Fungus Laricis, Galle, Herba Sabine, 
Indigo, Mastiche, Opium,’ Piper longum, Radix Glycyr- 
rhize, Radix Rhei (?), Rhizoma Filicis, Rhizoma Tridis, 
Sandaraca, Scammonium, Semen Feni greci,’ Semen Lini, 
Semen Sinapis, Succinum, Siliqua dulcis, Succus Glycyrrhize, 
Terebinthina and Tragacantha. 
That the number of plants employed in classical antiquity 
was very considerable is shown particularly in the writings of 
-Dioscorides and Pliny,’ to which the following centuries until 
the close of the European middle ages continually refer, and 
indeed, almost without any advancement, on their own part, of 
the existing knowledge. Many plants of the Italian flora which 
are employed medicinally have often been thoroughly considered 
by Roman writers on agriculture, namely, by Cato, Columella, 
Palladius and Varro. Columelia * (in the years 35 to 65 a.D.) 
had also made observations in Spain and Syria. The principal 
contents of their writings, so far as they come into consideration 
here, are to be found compiled in a very complete and systemati- 
cally arranged form in Magerstedt’s ‘‘ Bilder aus der rémischen 
Landwirthschaft.”* Hehn also, though with much more spirit _ 
1 These might have perhaps also been quoted under division 2, page 19. 
? To the editions of Pliny mentioned in Fiiickiger’s ‘‘ Pharmakognosie,’”” 
pp. 997 and 1,014, the new translation by Wittstein may be added. | 
* Fliickiger, loc. cit., p. 991, etc. Compare also, Meyer, ‘‘ Geschichte — 
der Botanik,” Bd. I. and II., Kénigsberg, 1854, 1855. 
4 Heft IV., Sondershausen, 1861: ‘‘ Die Obstbaumzucht der Romer;” i 
Heft V. (1862): ** Der Feld-, Garten- und Gemiisebau der Rémer;” oe ae 
(1863): “‘Die Bienenzucht und die Bienenpflanzen der Romer.” The 
author does not enter upon the consideration of the —— of sana : 
plant names. S 
