SEMEN RICINI. 567 



Uses — Croton seeds are not administered. The oil is given 

 internally as a powerful cathartic, and is applied externally as a 

 rubefacient. 



Substitutes — The seeds of Croton Pavcmce Hamilton, a native of 

 Ava and Camrup (Assam), and those of C. ohlongifolius Roxb., a small 

 tree common about Calcutta, are said to resemble those of C. Tiglium L., 

 but we have not compared them. Those of Baliosperrnum montanum 

 Mull. Arg. (Croton j^olyandrus Roxb.) partake of the nature of croton 

 seeds, and according to Roxburgh are used by the natives of India as 

 a purgative. 



SEMEN RICINI. 



Semen Cataputice majoris; Castor Oil Seeds, Palraa Christi Seeds; 

 F. Semence de Ricin ; G. Ridnussamen. 



Botanical Origin — Ricinus communis L., the castor oil plant, is a 

 native of India where it bears several ancient Sanskrit names.^ By 

 cultivation, it has been distributed through all the tropical and many 

 of the temperate countries of the globe. In the regions most favourable 

 to its growth, it attains a height of 40 feet. In the Azores, and the 

 warmer Mediterranean countries as Algeria, Egypt, Greece, and the 

 Riviera, it becomes a small tree, 10 to 15 feet high; while in France, 

 Germany, and the south of England, it is an annual herb of noble foliage, 

 growing to a height of 4 or 5 feet. In good summers, it ripens seeds in 

 England and even as far north as Christiania in Norway. 



Ricinus communis exhibits a large number of varieties, several of 

 which have been described and figured as distinct species. Miiller, 

 after a careful examination of the whole series, maintains them as a 

 single species, of which he allows 16 forms, more or less well marked.- 



History — The castor oil plant was known to Herodotiis who calls . \ 

 it K//ct, and states that it furnishes an oil much used by the Egyptians, (^ 



in whose ancient tombs seeds of Ricinus are, in fact, met with.* At the '^ 



period when Herodotus wrote, it would appear to have been already in- 

 troduced into Greece, where it is cultivated to the present day under 

 the same ancient name.* The Kihajon of the Book of Jonah, rendered 

 by the translators of the English Bible gourd, is believed to be the same 

 plant. KiVi is also mentioned by Strabo as a production of Egypt, the 

 oil from which is used for burning in lamps and for unguents. 



Theophrastus and Nicander give the castor oil plant the name of 4'^ f^ 

 KpoTWf. Dioscorides, who calls it \\.lki or ^poroov, describes it as of ' 



the stature of a small fig-tree, with leaves like a plane, and seeds in a 

 prickly pericarp, observing that the name Kportoi' is applied to the 

 seed on account of its resemblance to an insect [Ixodes Ricinus Latr.], 

 known by that appellation. He also gives an account of the process 

 for extracting castor oil {Wikivov eXaiov), which he says is not fit for 

 food, but is used externally in medicine ; he represents the seeds as 



^ The most ancient and most usual is ^ Jottrn. of Botany, 1879, 54. 



Eranda ; this word has passed into several * Heldreich, JS'utzpjianzen GriechenlancU, 



other Indian languages. Athen, 1862. 58. 



- De Candolle, Prodr., xv. sect. 2. 1017. 



