142 
On the Sesamoids of the Knee- Joint 
vescuntur celeriter implet ; stomachumque subvertit, ac tarde concoquitur, pingueque corpori 
praebet alimentuiii. Liquet ergo, qviod ventriculi partibus vigoreni ac robur addere nequit, quem- 
adniodiim neque aliud quodvis piugue. Est autem crassi succi, ideoqiie non propere pervadit. Ipso 
aut solo non admodum vescuntur, sed cum melle crudo quas vulgo o-to-/x('Sas \'ocant effingentes. 
Pauibus etiam inspergitur*. Porro, queniaduiodum milio panicum (quod etiam ixeXlvrjs diximus 
aijpellari) adsiraile quidem quodammodo est, verum undequaque deterius ; ad eundem modum & 
sesamo erysimum corporis substantia quodam pacto est affine, sed in cibo est insuavius, corporique 
alimentum parcius exhibit, praedictoque omnino est deterius. Caeterum utrumque temperamento 
est calidum, ol) eamque causam sitem etiam excitat. 
A further reference to Sesamoides occurs in Galen's commentary on Hippocrates' 
book De victus ratione in viorbis acatisf. 
Sesamoides superiorem ^'entrem purgat sesquidrachmae pondere in oxymelete tritum et potui 
datum. Miscetur autem veratris ita ut tertiam efficiat partem. Nempe id hoc pacto minus 
suftbcat. 
Lastly in (ialcn's book De suhstitutis medecinis\ we read that the substitute : 
"pro sesamo" is Linisemen (Xivucnrupos), i.e. hnseed, "pro se.samoide" is Amaranthi exprcssio 
{dfiapdvTov nieaixa), "pro Liniscmine " is Fahau medulla. 
There can be small doubt that for Galen sesame was an emollient, Sesamoides 
magnum a purgative, and Sesamoides album an emetic. The plants and their seeds 
have so little real resemblance that it is not impossible that the oil-giving property 
was the source of their common name§. 
* Sesame cakes or puddings were known to Xenophon and Aristophanes, 
t Opera, Basileae, 1561, Septima Classis, p. 296, com. m, cap. 123. 
J Opera, Basileae, 1561, Quinta Classis, pp. 173 — 4. It is clear that Galen distinguished linseed 
definitely from sesame, although he notes the emollient properties of sesame. See also the De alimen- 
torum facuUalibus, Liber i, cap. xxxii. 
§ On p. 295 of the Rariorum Plantarum Historia 1601 of Carolus Clusins are given outs of Sesamoides 
magnum Salmantic. and Sesaynoides parvuni Sah)iatitic., which indicate what was the type of plant denoted 
by these names in the latter half of the sixteenth century. Dr Stapf has kindly examined Clusius' figures 
for us. He says they are excellent figures, that the Sesamoides magnum is Silene Otites, Sm. and that 
Astrocarpus Clusii, J. Gay, is drawn for Sesamoides jjarvum. He has further found figures of the two 
Sesamoides in the Codex Vindohonensis (±a. 500 a.d.). Senecio lividns is figured as S. magnum and 
Dorycnium hirsutum as S. minus. Thus in Galen's time, in 500 a.d. and at the end of the sixteenth 
century we find different plants named as Sesamoides, and neither of the sets of figures here referred to 
are in the least helpful in interpreting what Galen understood by these plants, nor do the seeds of these 
plants throw any additional light on the adoption of the word by the anatomists — they are not more like 
a sesamoid bone than sesame itself. Dr Stapf throws light on the matter in the following note : 
" I have also gathered much information with respect to the attempts made by the writers of the 
renaissance to explain the two Sesamoides of Dioscorides, and particularly their reference to species of 
Reseda. I thought there might have beeu some tradition linking up their interpretation with the classic 
writers. So far as the Arabic literature is available to me there does not seem to be any such connection, 
but I have not seen Ibn Baithar who I understand quotes from an Arab author. As far as I can see the 
interpretations of the herbalists were nothing but more or less ingenious guesses. The Reseda 
theory can be traced back to Luca Ghini who laid out and was in charge of the Botanic Garden at Pisa 
from 1544 — 1555. Amatus Lusitanicus (1554) also speaks of having been told by a nobleman of Padua 
that the Sesamoides maius of Dioscorides has been found in Italy, but does not say what it is. Amatus 
Lusitanicus was a Salamanca student, and it is just possible that he was instrumental in starting the 
Reseda theory in his University where Clusius seems to have picked it up subsequently. There was no 
prominent botanist at Salamanca at the time of Clusius' short visit (1565) — we know in fact that he had 
a very low opinion of the ' viri docti ' of the Spain which he knew — and no importance can be attached 
to his interpretation of the two Sesamoides." 
