486 LILTACEM 



ASPARAGUS OFFICINALIS, Linn. 



Fig. — Eng. Bof., 339 ; Blachc, t. 332 ; Sperage, Asparagus 

 {Eng.)y Asperge {Fr.). 



Hab. — Europe, Southern Russia, Turkey, Cultivated 

 in Persia and Northern India. The plant, root, and ripe fruit. 



J- 



Vernacular. — The fruit, Haliyun {IruL Bazars). 



History, Uses, &C. — Asparagus was well known to the 

 Greeks and Homans both wild and in a cultivated state. 

 Hippocrates mentions it in his treatise on diet, and in his 

 treatise on the Diseases of Women he says that the berries taken 

 in wine promote conception, Dioscorides and Pliny describe 

 its medicinal properties, and Cato {De re Rust. c. 161) gives 

 full directions concerning its cultivation. The ancients 

 considered it to be a wholesome vegetable, dispelling flatulency 

 and acting as a mild aperient, diuretic and aphrodisiac. They 

 administered the root in wine for calculous affections and pains 

 in the uterus, and also considered it beneficial in elephantiasis. 

 Ibn Sina calls it ^^t haliun and quotes Galenas opinion of its 

 medicinal value. 



The Western Arabs call it Isferaj ; in Persia it is known as 

 Marchahch and Margiyeh "snake wort/' from its being 

 considered to be an antidote for snake poison. Wild asparagus, 

 the A, tenmfolkis of Linnsous, was known to the Koraans as 

 Corruda, a name still current in the south of France, where the 

 plant is valued for its medicinal properties up to the present 

 time. Broussais considered asparagus to be a sedative in 

 palpitation of the heart, and it is still used in France as a 



cardiac dropsy and chronic gout- The young shoots 

 when eaten as a vegetable are well known to communicate a 

 peculiar and offensive odour to the urine, a syrup for medicinal 

 use is prepared with their juice, 100 parts after clarification 

 being added to 190 parts of sugar. 



m 



Some 



our 



goes it has no ill-effects when taken daily for a considerable 



time. Indian Mahometan writers on medicine merely retail 



