478 MEDICAL BOTANY. 



Common Names. — Scammony ; Syrian Bind-weed. 



Foreign Names. — Scammonee, Fr. ; Scamhnonea, It. ; Scammonium, 

 Ger. 



Description. — Root fleshy, fusiform, with a light-gray epidermis, and abounding in a 

 milky juice. Stems several, slender, cylindrical, villous. The leaves are sagittate, alter- 

 nate, smooth, pointed, of a bright-green colour, truncate at base, and supported on long 

 petioles. The flowers are on slender, erect stems, divided above into two or more pedi- 

 cels, each supporting a pale-yellow flower. Calyx with 5 emarginate sepals. Corolla 

 funnel-shaped; limb entire, somewhat reflexed. Stamens five; ovary 2-celled, supporting 

 a long slender style, with two linear, cylindrical stigmas. Capsule two-celled, with small 

 pyramidal seeds. 



It is a native of Turkey, Syria, Greece, Persia, &c. According to Russel, 

 it is found in great abundance on the mountains between Aleppo and Latakia, 

 whence most part of the Scammony of commerce is obtained. 



The time for collecting the milky juice, which, when inspissated, farms the 

 drug known as Scammony, is in the beginning of June; this is done as fol- 

 lows. " Having cleared away the earth from the upper part of the root, the 

 top is cut off in an oblique direction, about two inches below where the stalks 

 spring from it. Under the most depending part of the slope, a shell is fixed, 

 or some other convenient receptacle, into which the milky juice gradually 

 flows. It is then left about twelve hours, which time is sufficient for the 

 drawing off the whole juice; this, however, is in small quantity, each root 

 affording but a few drachms. This milky juice, from the several roots, is 

 put together, often into the leg of an old boot, for want of some more proper 

 vessel, when in a little time it grows hard, and is the genuine scammony. 

 It is the root only that produces this concrete, for the stalks and leaves near 

 the root, even when pressed, afford no signs of a milky juice. Of this en- 

 tirely pure scammony, but very little is ever brought to market, the greatest 

 part of what is to be met with, being adulterated." (Russel, Med. Inquir., 

 i. 18.) This adulteration is principally practised at the ports from whence it 

 is shipped, and consists of various admixtures of sand, ashes, chalk, &c, and 

 probably of an extract of some other vegetable. There are several varieties 

 met with in commerce. The best is light, resinous when broken, and is fri- 

 able, not effervescing on the addition of an acid, nor rendered blue by iodine; 

 the colour varies much, especially in large masses ; but when good, it is 

 always of a brownish-gray colour in powder. Russel states, that those who 

 gather it assert, that the difference of colour depends on the different modes 

 of drying it. Pereira has given a very full description of the varieties of 

 this drug found in London, which applies also to those occurring in the shops 

 in this country. (Elem. Mat. Med., ii. 339.) 



It has been several times examined, with different results, according to the 

 purity of specimens operated upon. In the first quality, Aleppo, Macquart 

 found Resin, Wax, Extractive, Gum, Albumen, &c. Besides the true Scam- 

 mony, there are a number of other products bearing the same name, either 

 wholly fictitious or derived from other plants, the best known of which is 

 called Smyrna Scammony, and is said, though the fact is not proved, to be 

 obtained from a species of Sccamone, and the French or Montpellier is the 

 product of a Cynanchum. 



Medical Properties. — Scammony was employed as a drastic purgative by 

 Hippocrates and other Greek physicians, but it has been thought that the 

 article they used was produced by other species of the Convolvulaccoe. It 

 was also used by the Roman practitioners, and Celsus speaks of it as a good 

 anthelmintic. The Arabian writers, with the exception of Rhazes, thought 

 it too powerful a remedy to be employed, and even he advises it to be used 



