POISONS AND STATISTICS ON POISONS 3 



in Venice between the tenth and seventeenth centuries, the government secretly 

 recognizing the operations of these criminals and paying a sum of money for the 

 execution of prisoners of note. However, these efforts were not often success- 

 ful. J. Baptisa Porta, in the sixteenth century, wrote under the title of 

 "Natural Magic," a work devoted partly to cookery and partly to poisons and 

 how to use them. 



The early methods of detecting the presence of poisons were crude; the 

 surroundings were always noted; the suspected poison was generally admin- 

 istered to an animal and, if it died, poison was sure to be diagnosed without 

 further investigation, since the early church forbade postmortem examination. 

 Later, however, doctors were permitted to dissect and thus become familiar with 

 pathological changes. 



THE RISE OF CHEMISTRY AND POISONS 



At the close of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth cen- 

 turies, chemistry had advanced sufficiently to test for arsenic and the more 

 important mineral poisons. Scheele discovered prussic acid; other chemists, as 

 Berthollet, Lavoisier, and Stahl, added to the chemical knowledge of poisons 

 The father of modern toxicology, however, was Bonaventura Orfila, whose 

 work was published in 1814. Derosne discovered the alkaloids of narcotin 

 and morphin in 1818. Pelletier and Cavantou discovered strychnin in 1818. 

 Giesecke discovered coniine in 1827, and Geiger and Hesse separated atropin 

 and hyoscyamin in 1833. 



The modern aspect of the subject began with treatises on poisons by such 

 workers as Vogel * and Richard Mead, 2 and writings on the subject of chemistry 

 through the works of Stahl, Scheele, Berthollet, Priestly and Lavoisier. Bot- 

 anists, too, at this time began to be greatly interested in a study of poisonous 

 plants. Thus we have the work of Bulliard 3 and the work of Gmelin. 4 The 

 work of Bulliard discusses a large number of poisonous plants with excellent il- 

 lustrations, and Gmelin treats quite fully of the then known poisonous plants 

 of Europe. 



The works of Gmelin, Bulliard and Plenck 5 on Toxicology, and Buchner's 

 Toxicology 6 were frequently quoted by the older writers. The greatest of the 

 older writers, however, was Orfila 7 whose great work on toxicology became the 

 recognized authority on toxicology. This work was first published in 1814, and 

 passed through many editions. Orfila conducted actual experiments with differ- 

 ent plants. This work of Orfila was also translated into different languages, 8 

 Orfila was preceded by Fodere. 9 About that period other toxicologies were 

 published in France and Germany, such as those of Sobernheim and Simon, 10 



1 The Usefulness of Natural Philosophy. 1654. 



2 Mechanical Theory of Poisons. 



3 Historic des plantes veneneuses et suspectes de la France. Paris 1784. Folio X, 177 

 p., 72 tab. col. Ed. II: Paris 1798. 



4 Abhandlung von den giftigen Gewachsen. Ulm. 1775. Allegemeine Geschichte der 

 Pffanzengifte. Nurnberg 1777. 



5 Toxicolgia, seu doctrina de venenis et antidotis. Viennae, Graeffer. 1785, 338 p. 



6 Toxicologie. Nurnberg. 1827. 



7 Traite des poisons, ou Toxicologie generate. Paris, 1813. Ed. Ill, ib. 1826. Orfila 

 and Bonaventura. Traite des Poisons ou Toxicologie Generale. Paris, 1814. (Ed. 5) 1852. 



8 Toxicologie. Seemann & Karls. 2 Vols. Berlin 1829-1831. 



9 Nedec leg. Ed. 2. 



10 Handbuch der praktischen Toxicologie. Berlin, 1838. Toxicologie. Nurnberg, 1827, 

 2nd Ed. 



