BOOK XXIII. Lxxxi. 163-LXXX111. 166 



suflficient remedy merely to carry on the person a 

 sprig of myrtle that has touched neither iron nor the 

 ground. 



LXXXII. I have described " the preparation of iiyrtidanum. 

 myrtidanum. It is beneficial to the uterus, whether 

 used as a pessary, a fomentation, or a liniment, 

 being much more efficacious than the bark of the tree 

 or the leaves or the berries. There is also extracted 

 a juice from the leaves ; the most tender are crushed 

 in a mortar, a dry wine or sometimes rain water 

 poured on them Httle by little, and the liquid now * 

 drawn off. It is used for sores in the mouth and 

 of the anus, for those of the uterus, or of the intes- 

 tines, for darkening the hair, for moisture at the 

 arm-pits, for clearing away freckles, and whenever 

 an astringent remedv is indicated. 



LXXXIII. The wild myrtle, oxymyrsine <^ or «'iw 

 chamaemyrsine,'^ is distinguished from the cultivated '"^ *" 

 by its red berries and small size. Its root is much 

 esteemed. A decoction in wine is taken for pains in 

 the kidneys and for strangury, particularly when the 

 urine is thick and of foul odour; for jaundice and 

 purging the uterus it is pounded with wine. The 

 young stalks also are cooked in ashes and taken as 

 food in the sanie way as asparagus. The berries, 

 taken with wine or with oil and vinegar, break up 

 stone in the bladder ; pounded also in vinegar and 

 rose oil it reUeves headache, and taken in drink the 



" See XIV. § 104. It is myrtle wine, but the fivpTiSavov of 

 Dioscorides is different. See critical note. 



* Such apparently is the sense of etiam here, the iam 

 predominating. 



' Oxymyrsine = prickly myrtle. 



^ Chamaemyrsine = ground myrtle. 



