522 PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 



latter appears to be by far the more original of the two, and I believe 

 that investigatiou will prove that this chapter was added to the pseudo- 

 Apuleiau work after the publication of Avicenna's writings, and is based 

 on him.* The emphatic way in which the anaesthetic virtues of man- 

 dragora are proclaimed attracts attention ; but tlie language is somewhat 

 grotesque — if any one is to have a member amputated (? : emutilanduni) 

 or burned or sawed (!) — and it sounds more like that of an enthusiastic 

 scholar who has stumbled on a very remarkable statement which he is 

 eager to promulgate, than of a competent medical writer. We can 

 hardly base any argument for this use of mandragora in antiquity on 

 this passage. 



10 and 11. Pliny and Dioscorides. The lives of these writers were 

 contemporary, though Pliny appears to have finished his work a little later 

 than Dioscorides. t The multitude of striking parallels in their writings 

 shows that they stand in close relation to each other. Dioscorides has 

 been tI)ought by some to have used Pliny, and others have thought that 

 Pliny drew from Dioscorides. The correct view is beyond doubt that 

 of Wellmann, that they based their botanical writings upon common 

 sources, and chiefly upon Sextius Niger, who flourished in the first half 

 of the first century of the Christian era. The work of Sextius, how- 

 ever, appears to have been a compilation, so that we are unable to trace 

 to their original source the parts which Dioscorides and Pliny took from 

 him.t 



A careful comparison of the mandragora passages in Dioscorides and 

 Pliny makes it evident that they are among those which the two writers 

 took from a common source. As has been pointed out, the passages 

 essentially agree ; the slight discrepancies have been discussed above. 



The interpolator of the synonyms in the rest of tlie work might easily liave ob- 

 tained them for mandragora by consulting Dioscorides. That tiicy are not given 

 indicates that the chapter did not belong to tlie work when the synonyms were 

 added to t^iie otlier ciiapters. 



* Even if it shoukl be proven that Avicenna drew from this cliapter, instead of 

 vice versa, it would not at all weaken the force of tlie argument that Avicemia 

 knew of this use of mandragora by personal experience, for there is no mention 

 here of a distinction in the quantity necessary to produce sleep and stupor respec- 

 tively. But the very character of the pseudo-Apuleian work — it was written and 

 circulated for the layman's use, to enable him to do without the services of the 

 physicians, (]ui saeviores ipsis viorbis eristant (Koebert, p. Ill) — makes it highly 

 improbable that a medical writer would liave used it. 



t Meyer, vol. 2, p. 100. 



X On the whole question see Wellmann, Hermes, 24 (1889), p. 630 fE. 



