Aelian (Claudius Aelianus), On the Nature of Animals, 16, 27 (= BNJ 86F 21b)
“Agatharkhides claims that there is a group of people in Libya–and that they are also called the Psylli–in most ways they aren’t really different from the rest of humankind in their lifestyle except that their body has a strange and incredible quality that sets them apart. You see, creatures that sting as part of attacking don’t harm these people at all!
Indeed, they don’t even notice a snakebite or a spider-bite that might be fatal to other people, nor even a scorpion’s sting. When one of the creatures gets near them and touches them, it acts like it has taken some sleep-causing drug as soon as it smells them! They contract a kind of drowsiness or drugged state and become weak and slow until the person walks away.
Also, when they want to test whether their babies are trueborn or bastards, they leave them in the middle of snakes just as I said above, the way gold-workers test metal in fire.”
This is one of several scenes in the Church of Ura Kidane Mihret depicting snake-like creatures. In this panel, the snake appears to have gotten out of hand, and the man on the right is in the process of lopping off the snake’s head with what look like metal shears. Zeghie Peninsula, Lake Tana, Ethiopia.
SGDI 15632 (Teos, c. 475 BCE; from Buck, Greek Dialects: Ionic Inscriptions, 3)
“Who ever should make deadly drugs for the Teian community or for an individual, destroy him and his family. Whoever stops the importation of grain into the Teian land or repels it as it is being imported either with skill or device and on sea or on land, destroy him and his family.”
Aristotle (On Plants) and Galen (varia) define deleterious medicines (δηλητήρια φάρμακα) as those that are fatal to human beings, such as poisonous venom or substances coming from hemlock (or concentrations of opium, henbane etc.). Of course, such things are weaponized fairly early in human history as this threatening inscription above from Teos illustrates.
Scholia bT ad Il. 1.594
“[The Sintian men}: Philokhoros says that because they were Pelasgians they were called this because after they sailed to Brauron they kidnapped the women who were carrying baskets. For they call “harming” [to blaptein] sinesthai.
But Eratosthenes says that they have this name because they are wizards who discovered deadly drugs. Porphyry says that they were the first people to make weapons, the things which bring harm to men. Or, because they were the first to discover piracy.”
“He also gave them some deadly drugs to give to him in secret if they were able to persuade some of the cooks or waiters, even though [Albinus’] friends were suspicious and advising him to safeguard himself against a deceptively clever adversary.”
Aelian (Claudius Aelianus), On the Nature of Animals, 16, 27 (= BNJ 86F 21b)
“Agatharkhides claims that there is a group of people in Libya–and that they are also called the Psylli–in most ways they aren’t really different from the rest of humankind in their lifestyle except that their body has a strange and incredible quality that sets them apart. You see, creatures that sting as part of attacking don’t harm these people at all!
Indeed, they don’t even notice a snakebite or a spider-bite that might be fatal to other people, nor even a scorpion’s sting. When one of the creatures gets near them and touches them, it acts like it has taken some sleep-causing drug as soon as it smells them! They contract a kind of drowsiness or drugged state and become weak and slow until the person walks away.
Also, when they want to test whether their babies are trueborn or bastards, they leave them in the middle of snakes just as I said above, the way gold-workers test metal in fire.”
This is one of several scenes in the Church of Ura Kidane Mihret depicting snake-like creatures. In this panel, the snake appears to have gotten out of hand, and the man on the right is in the process of lopping off the snake’s head with what look like metal shears. Zeghie Peninsula, Lake Tana, Ethiopia.
SGDI 15632 (Teos, c. 475 BCE; from Buck, Greek Dialects: Ionic Inscriptions, 3)
“Whoever should make deadly drugs for the Teian community or for an individual, destroy him and his family. Whoever stops the importation of grain into the Teian land or repels it as it is being imported either with skill or device and on sea or on land, destroy him and his family.”
Aristotle (On Plants) and Galen (varia) define deleterious medicines (δηλητήρια φάρμακα) as those that are fatal to human beings, such as poisonous venom or substances coming from hemlock (or concentrations of opium, henbane etc.). Of course, such things are weaponized fairly early in human history as this threatening inscription above from Teos illustrates.
Early medical authors understood the moral obligations of physicians and pharmacologists:
Galen, Method of Medicine 816k
“There is, therefore, a safe limit of medical treatment for one struggling admirably according to the practice of medicine against a sickness—and it is also the safeguard of ability for the one who is trying to soothe the pain. Beyond this is the work of a poor doctor, resulting in the end of the patient’s life with the sickness.
It is a flatterer’s act to try to please the patient, because this places pleasure not health as the primary aim. Practitioners descend into these kinds of extremes in many ways but especially in different types of treatments among which are chiefly the so-called anodyne medicines which are made from the poppy or seed of henbane, the root of mandrake, the storax or any other kind of thing.
Doctors who yield to the sick and use too much of these sorts of drugs destroy their patients with the pains as much as those who give them at the wrong time, in the wrong measure, or not at all.
Therefore, just as in everything else in life—in habits and actions—here the appropriate guideline to take is “nothing in excess”. The appropriate marker is the health of the sick…”
“[The Sintian men]: Philokhoros says that because they were Pelasgians they were called this because after they sailed to Brauron they kidnapped the women who were carrying baskets. For they call “harming” [to blaptein] sinesthai.
But Eratosthenes says that they have this name because they are wizards who discovered deadly drugs. Porphyry says that they were the first people to make weapons, the things which bring harm to men. Or, because they were the first to discover piracy.”
“He also gave them some deadly drugs to give to him in secret if they were able to persuade some of the cooks or waiters, even though [Albinus’] friends were suspicious and advising him to safeguard himself against a deceptively clever adversary.”
SGDI 15632 (Teos, c. 475 BCE; from Buck, Greek Dialects: Ionic Inscriptions, 3)
“Who ever should make deadly drugs for the Teian community or for an individual, destroy him and his family. Whoever stops the importation of grain into the Teian land or repels it as it is being imported either with skill or device and on sea or on land, destroy him and his family.”
Aristotle (On Plants) and Galen (varia) define deleterious medicines (δηλητήρια φάρμακα) as those that are fatal to human beings, such as poisonous venom or substances coming from hemlock (or concentrations of opium, henbane etc.). Of course, such things are weaponized fairly early in human history as this threatening inscription above from Teos illustrates.
Scholia bT ad Il. 1.594
“[The Sintian men}: Philokhoros says that because they were Pelasgians they were called this because after they sailed to Brauron they kidnapped the women who were carrying baskets. For they call “harming” [to blaptein] sinesthai.
But Eratosthenes says that they have this name because they are wizards who discovered deadly drugs. Porphyry says that they were the first people to make weapons, the things which bring harm to men. Or, because they were the first to discover piracy.”
“He also gave them some deadly drugs to give to him in secret if they were able to persuade some of the cooks or waiters, even though [Albinus’] friends were suspicious and advising him to safeguard himself against a deceptively clever adversary.”
