PAPAVER 



SOMNIFERUM 

 History 



THE OPIUM POPPY 



Roman 

 Empire. 



Arab 

 Influence. 



Afyun. 



Sanskrit Name. 



Indian 

 Knowledge. 



Post or Pusl. 



Khakftas. 



Chinese 

 Knowledge. 



Minang. 



Red and White 



Milk of the 

 Poppy. 



Early 

 Exports 

 from India. 



opion, while Dioscorides narrates with the minutest detail the process of 

 extracting and manufacturing the drug, and is careful to distinguish it from 

 the older preparation meconium. In his time the drug would seem to have come 

 mainly from Asia Minor. Indeed, during the Roman Empire, as also the early 

 Middle Ages, the only sort of opium known was that of Asia Minor. And even 

 in the 13th century Simon Januensis (physician to Pope Nicholas IV.) spoke of 

 Opium thebaicum. 



But if the Greeks discovered the potent juice opium the Arabs were chiefly 

 concerned in disseminating the knowledge of the plant and its uses. The Arab 

 medical writers from about the 9th to 12th centuries give a full account of it 

 derived almost exclusively from Dioscorides and Galen. That the followers of 

 the faith of Islam proclaimed the properties of opium to the people of India 

 and China there can be no doubt, since the Sanskrit and all the vernacular names 

 in use to-day are clearly traceable to the Semitic corruption of opos or opion 

 into afyun. Thus the Hindi afim points to afyun as the transitional stage from 

 opion. In the same way the Arabs carried the poppy capsules and opium to China, 

 hence the name ya-pien, also a-fou-yong, in the Chinese language. Previous 

 to the Tang dynasty the opium poppy was apparently not known to the Chinese. 

 According to one writer the Sanskrit name is ahiphena, and, explained as 

 meaning " snake venom," would thus not be derived from the Greek. But it 

 is more often written ahipana, a word which most authors speak of as being 

 quite modern and derived directly from the Arabic. Sir George Birdwood 

 (E.I.C. First Letter Book, liv.), for example, says, " It does not occur anywhere 

 until it appears in a Sanskrit dictionary published in Calcutta about seventy 

 years ago." Mr. R. M. Dane (Hist. Mem., in Rept. Boy. Comm. on Opium, vii., 

 app., 28-63) says that evidence was placed before the Commission to the effect 

 that it is mentioned in the Bhavaprakasha and other Ayur-Vedic medical 

 works supposed to have been written not less than 800 years ago. He then 

 adds that the history of the production and use of opium in India before the 

 commencement of the 16th century is, however, obscure. 



On the other hand, Grierson (Bihar Peasant Life) gives a complete vocabu- 

 lary of words for the plant, its varieties, every part of it, as also every product 

 it affords and every feature and stage in its cultivation and manufacture. Still 

 there can be no possible doubt that the poppy cultivation of Bihar does not date 

 further back than a couple of centuries or so. While that view is doubtless 

 correct, and extreme caution is necessary, still there are words, such as post 

 or pust (already mentioned), that seem quite unconnected with Greek 

 literature, and which indicate, as has been suggested, a more ancient knowledge 

 of the plant than in its special sap opium. The word post usually denotes 

 the capsules, and in South India it becomes postaka-tol. Dutt tells us that 

 in Sanskrit the poppy capsules are khdkhas and the seeds khastila, but 

 that there is no classical name for opium. The seeds are kashkdsh in India 

 generally, and in South India gashagasha. So also in China there are names 

 for the poppy that carry the knowledge of the plant back to the 7th century. 

 Dr. Edkins (Hist. Notes on the Poppy in China, in Rept. Roy. Comm. on 

 Opium, 1894, L, app., 146-58) points out that in the 10th century the Emperor 

 Sung T'ai-tsu directed the first great medical work to be written ; in that, the 

 names given to the poppy are minang (= millet vessel) and ying-su (= jar-millet). 

 Both names of necessity denote the poppy capsule and its seeds, and involve 

 most probably a knowledge in their respective properties prior to the discovery of 

 opium. Su Sung compiled the second great medical work (which appeared in 1057 

 A.D.), and it is there stated that " the poppy is found everywhere. Many persons 

 cultivate it as an ornamental flower. There are two kinds, one with red flowers 

 and another with white." This, therefore, implied that though the name that 

 nowadays denotes opium had not come into use, the two forms of the opium- 

 yielding plant were well known in China at the period mentioned. Lin Hung, 

 in the 12th century, alludes to the milk from poppy heads. A poem written 

 during the Sung dynasty speaks of the poppy fields resembling snow. Thus 

 there can be no doubt the opium poppy was extensively cultivated in China 

 long anterior to the importation of India opium. Wang Shih, in the 13th 

 century, speaks of the prepared drug as simply magical in the treatment of 

 dysentery. 



At the beginning of the 16th century the opium imports into China from 

 India had not only been fully established, but the cultivation of the poppy plant 

 and the manufacture of opium at Malwa had become regular industries, thus 



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