518 PROCEEDINGS OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 



Two words in one of these passages are worthy of especial notice. 

 The passage in Dioscorides, 



Some persons boil down the roots in wine to a third, strain it, and put it 

 away, using one cyathus in the case of persons suffering from insomnia or 

 severe pain, or those about to be cut or cauterized, when they wish to pro- 

 duce anaesthesia, 



is given by Serapion thus : 



Some persons boil down the root of the mandragora with wine until a 

 third part of it disappears,* strain it, and put it away. They take a quantity 

 of one obol and give it for insomnia and to allay pain. And if it is necessary 

 to cut or cauterize any member, and loe wish the patient not to feel the pain, 

 let him be given more to drink. 



The two words to which I wish to call attention are we wish (volumus) and 

 more (plus). Dioscorides says: 



Some use a cyathus for insomnia and severe pain, and when they wish to 

 produce anaesthesia before cutting or cauterizing ; 



while Serapion says : 



Some take an obol and use it for insomnia and severe pain, and when we 

 wish to produce anaesthesia, let more be given. 



Serapion, then, if the Latin translator has correctly reproduced his words, 

 used a verb in the first person (voliwws) where he found a verb of the 

 third person (fBuvXovTat) in Dioscorides ; moreover, he himself added the 

 word more (plus), for Dioscorides says nothing about any distinction in 

 quantity here. This goes to show that Serapion did not depend entirely 

 upon Dioscorides for this information ; and since he was able to add 

 something to the words of Dioscorides, there seems ground for believing 

 that he knew of this use of mandragora from personal experience. This 

 view is confirmed by an examination of Avicenna's chapter on the plant. 



The works of Avicenna, the most celebrated Arabian physician and 

 philosopher, were in common use during the middle ages even in the 

 universities of Europe. His chief sources in general are Greek ; the 

 sources of his account of the mandragora are not so easy to trace as those 

 of Serapion 's, but it is evident that he draws here principally from Dios- 

 corides and Galen ; a very considerable part of the chapter shows a 

 marked resemblance to the chapter on mandiagora appended to the work 

 of Pseudo-Apuleius. 

 1 



* Tliere is a discrepancy here between Dioscorides and Serapion, perhaps due 

 to a mistranslation. 



