568 EUPHORBlACEiE. 



extremely purgative. There is a tolerably correct ligure of Rlcinus in 

 the famous MS. Dioscorides which was executed for the Empress Juliana 

 Anicia in A.D. 505, and is now preserved in the Imperial Library at 

 Vienna. 



The castor oil plant was cultivated by Albertus Magnus, Bishop of 

 Ratisbon, in the middle of the 13th century.^ It was well known as a 

 garden plant in the time of Turner (1568), who mentions the oil as 

 Oleum cicinum vel ricminum.^ Gerarde, at the end of the same century, 

 was familiar with it under the name of Ricinus or Kik. The oil he 

 says is called Oleum cicinum or Oleum de Cherua,^ and used externally 

 in skin diseases. 



After this period the oil seems to have fallen into complete neglect, 

 and is not even noticed in the comprehensive and eLCCurate Pharmacologia 

 of Dale (1693). In the time of Hill (1751) and Lewis (1761) Palma 

 Christi seeds were i-arely found in the shops, and the oil from them was 

 scarcely known.'* 



In 1764 Peter Can vane, a physician who had practised many years 

 in the West Indies, published a "Dissertation on the Oleum Palmce 

 Christi, sive Oleum Richii; or (as it is commonly call'd) Castor Oil,"' 

 strongly recommending its use as a gentle purgative. This essay, which 

 passed through two editions, and was translated into French, was 

 followed by several others,*" thus thoroughly drawing attention to the 

 value of the oil. Accordingly we find that the seeds of Ricinus were 

 admitted to the London Pharmacopoeia of 1788, and directions given 

 lor preparing oil from them. Woodville in his Medical Botany (1790) 

 speaks of the oil as having " lately come into frequent use." 

 y^ At this period and for several years subsequenth^ the small supplies 

 of the seeds and oil required for European medicine were obtained from 

 Jamaica.'^ This oil was gradually displaced in the market by that 

 produced in the East Indies: the rapidity with which the consumption 

 increased may be inferred from the following figures, representing the 

 value of the Castor Oil shipped to Great Britain from Bengal in 

 three several j^ears, namely 1813-14, £610; 1815-16, £1269; 1819-20, 

 £7102.' 



Description — The fruit of Ricinus is a tricoccous capsule, usually 

 provided with weak prickles, containing one seed in each of its three 

 cells. The seeds attain a length of y\ to yV, and a maximum breadth 

 of yV of an inch, and are of a compressed ellipsoid form. The apex of 

 the seed is prolonged into a short beak, on the inner side of which is a 



» Be VegetabiUbu.% ed. Jessen, 1867. 347. Lens, Diet, de Mat. Med. vi. (1834) 95. 



~ Turner's Herbal, pt. ii. 116. " How small was the traffic in Castor Oil 



3 From the Arabic kJiirva, i.e. Palma in those days, may be judged from the fact 



Christi. . that the stock in 1777 of a Loudon whole- 



* Hill, Hist, of the Mat. i/e(Z.,Lond. 1751. sale druggist (Joseph Gumey Bevan, pre- 



537. — Lewia, Hist, of the Mat. Med., Jjond. decessor of Allen and Hanburj's) was 2 



1761. 468. Bottles (1 Bottle = 18 to 20 ounces) valued 



^ The word castor- in connection with the at 8s. per bottle. The accounts of the same 



seeds and oil of Ricinus has come to us house show at stocktaking in 1782, 23 



from Jamaica, in which island, by some Bottles of the oil, which had cost 10s. per 



strange mistake, the plant was once called bottle. In 1799 Jamaica exported 236 



Agnus Castiis. The true Agnus Castas Casks of Castor Oil and 10 Casks of seeds 



( Vitex Agnus casttis L.) is a native of the (Kenny, Hist, of Jamaica, 1807. 235). 



Mediterranean countries and not of the ^ H. H. Wilson, Bevieto of the Extei-nal 



West Indies. Commerce of Bengal from 1813 to 1828, 



« For a list of which consult Merat et De Calcutta, 1830, tables pp. 14-15. 



