BOOK XXXIII. XXXV. 109-XXXVI. 112 



paunch in water, and when they take it out rub it 

 with soda, and grind it in mortars with salt as above. 

 In some cases people do not boil it but grind it up 

 with salt and then add water and rinse it. It is used 

 to make an eye-wash and for women's skins to 

 remove ugly scars and spots and as a hair-wash. 

 Its effect is to dry, to soften, to cool, to act as a 

 gentle purge, to fill up cavities caused by ulcers, 

 and to soften tumours ; it is used as an ingredient 

 in plasters serving these purposes, and for the 

 emollient plasters mentioned above. Mixed with § 105. 

 rue and myrtle and vinegar, it also removes 

 erysipelas, and likewise chilblains if mixed with 

 myrtle and wax. 



XXX\'I. Minium or cinnabar ° also is found in cinnabar 

 silver mines ; it is of great importance among pig- 

 ments at the present day, and also in old times it not 

 only had the highest importance but even sacred 

 associations among the Romans. Verrius gives a 

 Hst of writers of unquestionable authority who say 

 that on hoHdays it was the custom for the face of the 

 statue of Jupiter himself to be coloured with cinnabar, 

 as well as the bodies of persons going in a triumphal 

 procession, and that Camillus was so coloured in his 

 triumph, and that under the same ritual it was usual 

 even in their day for cinnabar to be added to 

 the unguents used at a banquet in honour of a 

 triumph, and that one of the first duties of the 

 Censors was to place a contract for painting Jupiter 

 with cinnabar. For my own part I am quite at a 

 loss to explain the origin of this custom, although 

 at the present day the pigment in question is known 

 to be in demand among the nations of Ethiopia 

 whose chiefs colour themselves all over with it, and 



85 



