OLD CURES

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXV, Issue 18612, 7 July 1930, Page 16

OLD CURES

MEDICINES OP EGYPT. Entering another decade of medicine as we are this year, we can expect any miracle to happen before it turns to 1940 (writer “A Doctor.” in the “Sydney Morning Herald.”) The advance of medicine has been practically confined to the past hundred years Man - is hundreds of thousands of years old. according to the opinions of the scientists that matter; it is surely an extraordinary thing, then, that it is only in the past century that he has managed to work out a scientific method of looking after himself, and treating the various illnesses to which his is heir. Of course, as far back as 4030 years ago we know that they had quite an influential race of medical men in most countries. Their cures were weird and wonderful, and their ’knowledge” astounding; but. as they had studied the human frame a little more than their fellows, they were respected accordingly, even as they are to-day. if. perhaps, with not as much reason. Before Tutankhamen was buried in th** Valley of the Kings medical men were writing prescriptions. Ip the British museum there are some prescriptions which have never yet been translated. They were not (as might be thought) written by a busy but illegible medico of our own generation, but actually date from the time of Cheops, one of the gentlemen in whose honour a pyramid was built. He reigned about 3700 B.C.

The “Ebers Papyrus.” said to have been written in the sixteenth century 8.C.. contains a wide selection of prescriptions. As a matter of fact, they are said to have been written before those you read in the §ook of Exodus. You may be interested to know that little boys of Moses's day probably had to take castor oil wi*h just the same unfortunate frequency as they do today. Of course, it was differentlv prepared. but it figures qui e largely on the “Ebers Papyrus.” according to translators. Other drugs known to these Scripture-time folk were aloes, cassia, peppermint, opium, anise, juniper. colchicum and squills. There were many others, but one mentions these because we use them to-day. The Egyptians, who also knew something about metals, used medicinally iron, lead, copper sulphate, sodium carbonate, and common salt. Precious stones were used with pathetic frequency, and you paid for your stone according to your means. Thus the upper classes used emeralds, and the common herd had to content themselves with green porcelain. More interesting still were the “drugs” made from animals. If you consulted a doctor in Moses’s day you were just as likely as not to be ordered lizards' blood, swines’ teeth, putrid meat, asses’ hoofs, or flies' excreta. The latter remedy was considered of extreme value in stopping babies from crying! The credulity of man is easily estimated when we consider that this animal group of drugs actually persisted to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

People who are looking for something effective for baldness might well consider the intriguing prescription of the apothecary to Schesch. a queen of the third dynasty. It read as follows: “The equal parts of the heel of an Abyssian greyhound, date blossoms, asses’ hoofs, and boil the collection in oil.” Another favourite remedy for the same trouble was: “Mix the fats of the horse, the crocodile, the hippopotamus. the cat, the snake, the ibex, and apply freely to the scalp." One thing to be said for this prescription is that it is probably just as effective as anything you get to-day. Baldness (unless it be a rare variety, known as alopecia areata) is incurable, just as it was then.

A most interesting point about ancient medicine is referred to by Herodotus, the Greek historian. w r ho, writing in the fifth century. 8.C.. says that the early Egyptians insisted that “no doctor was permitted to practice any but his own branch." a state of affairs to which the medical world of to-day is fast approaching. Another interesting point is that there were grievous penalties awarded to the dispenser who. making un a prescription, varied by one iota the ingredients ordered by the doctor. There is no doubt, in spite of their many ludicrous prescriptions, the old Egyptians knew quite a little about drugs. Of the medical papyri extant, there are seven important ones, and these contain the names of about 700 drugs, a greater number than in any modern-day pharmacopoeia.

The Chinese acted, and still act. on the principle laid down by an emphatic fellow-countryman several thousand years ago. This gentleman insisted that “if a medicine does not stir up a commotion in the patient. :he disease will not be cured by it.” Bearing this in mind, you will appreciate the fact that a Chinese cure for gastritis is earthworms rolled in honey, and that in addition centipedes are employed in children's diseases.

To return to castor oil. Although the seeds were ÜBed by the ancients, it was not until 1750 odd that it appeared as a regularly-used drug. Little boys will hate to know that a certain Dr. Peter Cavane. of Bath 'England), wrote several essays extolling its virtues. Froh that day it has never looked back.