ON BLACK HELLEBORE. 
167 
The description of Dioscorides is as follows : " The 
leaves are green, and like those of the Plane, sometimes 
they are less, and approach a little the leaves of the spondy- 
\\nm,{Heracleumsphondylium,) becominga little black, and 
incised in many places; the stem is coarse, and the flowers 
red, bordering on white, connected together in a cluster." 
Toiirnefort gave to it the name Helleborus niger orientalis. 
It was first figured by Desfontaines, in his Choix des 
Plantes du corollaire de Tournefort.'^ Dr. Sibthorp says 
he met with the same plant at Athos, Delphi, Olympus, 
Bithynia, in the mountains round Thessalonica,and also near 
Constantinople; it was the most commonly dift'used species. 
He gave o it the name H. officinalis^ and regards it as 
the iVK^eo^o^ fisT^a? of Dioscorides, which is evident from the 
description, officinalis, leaves pedate, scape multi- 
flowered, bracts digitate." {Flor Gnec.) The present Greek 
name for it is Exaptprj. By the Turks it is called Zopheme. 
The H. niger, of Italy, was also found by him in Laconia 
and Mt. Athos. Lemary in his Dictionnaire Utiiversel 
des Drogues Simples," calls this species Helleborus niger 
Hippocratis,^' to distinguish it from the other, and draws 
a clear distinction. A beautiful figure of the H. orientalis is 
given in the Botanical Register, vol. 28, t. 34, from a plant 
grown from roots sent to England, gathered on the Bithy- 
nian Olympus, by Mr. Sanderson, H. M. Consul at Brusa. 
From the preceding exposition, it is evident that the term 
black hellebore is not strictly confined to the species now 
recognized in the Pharmacopoeia, and what is said with re- 
spect to the mode of affecting the system, and its therapeu- 
tic employment, is applicable to two or more species. This 
applies especially to the ancient writers. 
The H. niger was introduced and cultivated in England 
in 1598, by Mr. John Gerhard. 
Connected with black hellebore, not only in the older 
works on the Materia Medica, but classically, is the name 
Melampodium, which, as stated by Dioscorides and other 
