100 FLORA HOMGOPATHICA. 
nigra), or, as others call it, Bryonia nigram or Chironiam vitam, 
as “ urinas porro cient, menses pellunt;” also in affections of the 
spleen; in epilepsy (comitialibus), vertigo, and paralysis. The 
leaves as beneficial, as topical applications in ulcers, etc. The 
Bryonia alba (dioica) he extols for many virtues, more particu- 
larly in gangrenes and wounds, whitlow, apoplexy, cough, 
induration of the spleen, etc. 
Pliny confounds them altogether, and Gerarde gives the 
following reason for his so doing. “Black Bryonia is called in 
Greek Awaedos wygia ; in Latin, Bryonia nigra, Vitis sylvestris, 
or wild vine; notwithstanding it does not a little differ from 
Labrusca or Vitis vinifera sylvestris, that is to say, from the 
wild vine which bringeth forth wine, which is likewise called 
Apaeros ayga. Why both these were called by one name 
Pliny was the cause, who could not sufficiently expound them 
in his 23rd Booke, first chapter, but confounded them and 
made them all one, in which error are also the Arabians.” 
Joannes Bodeus, in his Commentary on Theophrastus, gives 
the following definition of the two. “One species” (B. alb. Linn.), 
he says, “ bears black berries ; the other” (B. dioica) “red. The 
root of the one is darkish externally, a pale whitish-yellow 
internally ; the root of the other is white.” 
Matthiolus makes the Nigra vitis the Apaedos pcdawa of 
Dioscorides, the same as the Tamus communis; but the remark 
of Dioscorides, that the fruit, at first green, when ripe is black, 
confirms it as the Bryonia alba, the only one of the species 
that has this peculiarity, the berries of the Tamus being red; 
he gets over this by saying that, although Dioscorides repre- 
sents this, yet in: his country the berries always remain red. He 
evidently confounds the two plants, probably never having seen 
the Bryonia alba, as it is chiefly confined to the north of 
Europe. 
Dodonzus describes the true Bryonia alba under the name of 
Bryonia nigra; but Bauhin calls it Bryonia alba, and says, “ It 
differs from the common white Bryony only in that the root is 
