1. Sometimes like a small tongue, viz. the epiglottis.

2. Below the last ribs, &c.) I have here translated, according to an emendation proposed by Morgagni[ JC ], who would read, Qui lumbis sub imis costis inhÆrent, a parte earum rotundi, ab altera resimi. Where a small alteration renders the description just: whereas in the way it stands in all the editions, Qui lumbis sub imis coxis inhÆrent, a parte earum resimi, ab altera rotundi, it plainly contradicts truth, as will be very obvious to any person the least conversant in anatomy.

3. They are stocked with vessels, and covered with coats.) In Almeloveen, Et venosi sunt, et tunicis super conteguntur. Morgagni[ JD ] informs us, that after the three first words, all his editions agree in inserting Et ventriculos habent, and they have ventricles; and it is not probable our author would take no notice of these; and to the same purpose speaks Hippocrates de Ossium Natur. no. 8.

4. Relaxation of the nerves.) Resolutio nervorum he commonly uses for a palsy, yet he cannot intend that here, but a langour or slight relaxation of the solids.

5. Cervicalia.) Cervicale was used in a double sense by the Romans, either for a bolster, or a piece of dress resembling the neckcloth.

6. And venery, A venere.) It is probable that Almeloveen is wrong in omitting after this a vino, which is in Morgagni’s[ JE ] MS and all his editions especially as a few lines after, our author mentions the condition of allowing wine.

7. Nostrils are more open.) In Almeloveen magis pallent. Though the MS and CÆsar and Ruellius read thus, yet it is plain from the text itself that the other editions are right, which have it magis patent; for our author presently adds, in a worse state of the disorder, the contrary symptom: Si nares Æque clausÆ videntur. Morgagni, Ep, 6. p.140.

8. Aminean wine.) This, says Pliny, has the preference of all other wines, upon account of its strength, and its growing better by age. Plin. Nat. Hist. lib. xiv. cap. 2. And thus Virgil says, Georg. 2. line 97.—Sunt et AmineÆ vites, fortissima vina.

9. Liquid cerate, says Ægineta, such as is used for fractures, is prepared from two parts of oil and one of wax. Lib. vii. cap. 17.

10. Syrian oil.) I suppose our author must here mean what was called from its sweetness elÆomeli—which Pliny says is produced spontaneously in the maritime parts of Syria. It flows from the trees, fat, thicker than honey, thinner than resin, of a sweet flavour, and is used by the physicians. Plin. Nat. Hist. lib. xv. cap. 7.—And to the same purpose Dioscorid. lib i. cap. 37.—To this account P. Ægineta adds, that about two cyathi of this taken in a hemina of water discharge crude and bilious humours by stool; but that this draught is apt to stupefy a person, which, however, is not dangerous, but he would require to be excited. P. Æginet. lib. vii. cap. 3.

11. Synanche, or Cynanche.) According to AretÆus, the latter of these names was given to the distemper, either because it was common to dogs, or because these animals, even in health, hang out their tongues. Lib. i. de Caus. et Sign. Morb. Acut. cap. 7.

12. His belly must be opened. Si non febrit, venter solvendus est.) This I take to be the general direction; if he has no fever, the intestinal discharge must be promoted—Liquenda alvus, by which I understand the accomplishment of this by diet or medicines, and Interdum etiam ducenda, the use of clysters.

13. Lycium or puxacantha, box-thorn, a tree of the thorn-kind. The branches, with the leaves, are bruised and macerated for some days in water, then boiled, and after straining it, is boiled again to the consistence of honey. The best lycium is what will burn. It has an astringent quality. They adulterate it by mixing lees of oil, or the inspissated juice of wormwood or ox-gall in the boiling. Dioscorid. lib. i. cap. 133.

14. Frankincense, thus.) It is generally allowed, that what the ancients called thus, goes now under the name of olibanum.

15. Stomach.) When our author mentions the gullet and stomach together, as in the first chapter of this book, he calls the former stomachus, and the latter ventriculus; but he often comprehends both under the name of stomachus, as in this place, which appears by the disorders mentioned.

16. A powder with oil.) This word is pulvis—Our author does not say what powder. He had mentioned rose-oil just before: can he intend the powder of rose-leaves? or any of those powders he prescribes in the cardiac disorder, the last of which is quilibet ex via pulvis, any common dust? Or has the word, denoting the kind, been omitted by the copiers?

17. Sulphurated wool.) I suppose he means wool impregnated with the fumes of sulphur.

18. CutiliÆ, &c.) The waters of CutiliÆ in the country of the Sabines, Pliny says, are extremely cold, and by a kind of suction excite a sensation in the body like a bite; they are very useful to the stomach, nerves, and the whole body. Lib. xxxi. cap. 2. Our industrious critics and collectors have not been able hitherto to find any such place as SubruinÆ or SumbruinÆ, and therefore to cut the knot they cannot loose, propose to read here, as well as in the forecited place of Pliny, SubcutiliÆ.

19. Rhetic or Allobrogic.) These wines, whose qualities are here described, had their names from the countries where they were produced; the first was the Grisons, and the latter Savoy.

20. Signine.) This wine by reason of its great austerity was used as an astringent medicine in fluxes. It had its name from the town of Signia in Latium. Plin. Nat. Hist. lib. xiv. cap. 6.

21. Sesanum.) Dioscorides gives no description of this, but says, it is bad for the stomach, and produces a bad smell in the mouth. Lib. ii. cap. 369. Pliny tells us it is brought from India, and the colour of it is white, and it resembles the erysimum or hedge mustard in Greece and Asia. Lib. xviii. cap. 10. The moderns give this name to the oily purging grain.

22. Over it.) That is, through the teguments, so as to bring the part affected into view. I have here followed the old reading contra id, which Constantine upon the authority of an ancient MS. changed into ultra id; which I think does not afford so good a sense, though followed by Linden.

23. Cytisus is a shrub, all white like the buckthorn, sending out branches of a cubit’s length or more, about which are the leaves, resembling fenugreek; which being rubbed between the fingers smell like rocket. Dioscorid. lib. iv. cap. 695.

24. Acorns.) Dioscorides calls this ??a??? ??e????. It is the fruit of a tree like the myrica.—It resembles the Pontic nut: upon being squeezed like bitter almonds, it emits a moisture, which is used for ointments instead of oil.—It grows in Ethiopia, Egypt, and Arabia. Lib, iv. cap. 742.

25. Ferula answered to narthex among the Greeks, and was a general name for several herbs of the same genus, from whence some of the fetid gums are obtained, as sagapenum, and galbanum.—The ancients made use of the stalks of these herbs, in the same manner as paste-boards are now used for fractures, as will be seen in the eighth book.

26. Refreshing to nature.) I have given a sense of the phrase secundum naturam (which is the reading of Linden and Almeloveen) very near to that, in which the philosophers use it, because I can find no other.—Pinzius, Junta, and the Manutii read vel mentha secundum naturam est. As the books vary, and none of them make the meaning quite clear, it might perhaps be plainer, if it be read, vel quod secundum eam naturam est, that is, Or mint, or something of the same nature.

27. Regimen for such patients I have already mentioned.) Vid. book i. chap. 7.

28. Minium.) Pliny complains that minium, which was used by the painters, was of a poisonous nature, and through ignorance often given in medicine instead of the Indian cinnabar. This last, he says, is believed to be the gore of a dragon crushed by the weight of a dying elephant, with the mixture of the blood of these animals. Minium was found in the silver mines in both the Spains, but hard and sandy; also at Colchos in a certain inaccessible rock, but this was a spurious kind: the best was got near Ephesus.——Minium some of the Greeks call cinnabar, others miltos. Plin. lib. xxix. c. i. & lib. xxxiii. c. 7. Cinnabar, says Dioscorides, some mistake for what is called ammion: for this last is prepared from a certain stone mixed with the silver sand in Spain, and no where else. In the melting pot it changes into a very florid and flame colour: it has a suffocating steam in the mines: the painters make use of it. But cinnabar is brought from Libya, and sold at a great price, in so much that painters can hardly have it for their use: the colour of it is deep, whence some have imagined it to be the blood of a dragon: it has the same virtues as the hÆmatites stone. Lib. v. c. 883.—Miltos Sinopica, the best is solid and heavy, of a liver colour, not stony, very thin when melted. It is gathered in Cappadocia in certain caves; it is strained and brought to Sinope, and sold there, whence its name. It possesses a drying quality, and agglutinating, for which reason it is mixed with vulnerary plaisters, and drying and styptick troches. It binds the belly if taken with an egg, and is given in clysters to hepatick patients, Lib. v. c. 885.——Our author elsewhere prescribes minium from Sinope, which makes it probable, that he intended the miltos of Dioscorides. But upon comparing these several descriptions, which it is needless to enlarge upon, the learned reader may determine for himself.

29. Tetrapharmacum, or compounded of four medicines. Vid. lib. v. c. 19.

30. Myrrhapia.) So called, according to Pliny, from the likeness of their flavour to that of myrrh. Lib. xxv. c. 15.

31. If the hardness continue.) Si durities manet. This appears suspicious, as our author had mentioned no hardness before. In this chapter he first describes hysterick fits, then prescribes the proper treatment both during the paroxysms, and after they are over. We have very great reason to believe the whole chapter to be corrupted, for reasons which will be mentioned in a following note. With regard to this particular place, my opinion is, that after Celsus had finished what he had to say concerning hysterick fits, he next proceeded to treat of a hardness of the uterus; and after directing some remedies, in case of their failing, and the hardness continuing, he orders other medicines to be tried.—What renders this conjecture the more probable, is, that AretÆus, amongst the chronick diseases of the uterus, mentions s??????, a hardness. “There is,” says he, “another species of cancer, where there is no ulcer, but a hard and resisting tumour. The whole uterus is stretched, violent pains distress, and all the other symptoms are the same as in a cancerous ulcer of this part.” Lib. ii. de caus. et sig. morb. chron. c. 2.

32. Restringents must be used.) Si maligna purgatio est, subjicienda sunt coËrcentia: thus Linden and Almeloveen.—Morgagni observes, that the MS. copy of Alex. Paduan, after the words subjicienda sunt, not only has a great vacuity to the end of the page, but in the beginning of the next coËuntia, and in the margin opposite to this chasm are written these words, Desunt in vetustissimo exemplari duo folia. Two leaves are wanting in the oldest copy. In this also, where the indexes were prefixed to each book, he found the following in the fourth—Vulva exulcerata est—De vesica—De calculis in vesica—In omni dolore vesicÆ. And in the margin of the book, he found, Vulva ulcerata est, written opposite to Si vero vulva exulcerata est. Then should have followed the two other—And the last, namely, In omni dolore vesicÆ, was set over against PrÆter hÆc in omni dolore vesicÆ, and not vulvae, as Linden and Almeloveen read it.

In the MS. in the library of St Anthony at Venice, he found the preceding chasm much larger, 42 large pages, the same observation in the margin, and the correspondent numbers in the contents of the book.—Morgagn. ep. ii. p.45.—ep. iii. p.50. So that it is probable our author had first finished the diseases of the uterus, as being peculiar to women, and then proceeded to those of the urinary bladder, as common to both sexes.

33. And especially rue with vinegar, &c.) Almeloveen and Linden read, praecipueque ex aceto; vitare autem oportet rutam, et ne supinus dormiat. This is making Celsus condemn what all physicians almost have approved, and therefore with Constantine and Ronsseus, I read praecipueque ex aceto rutam: vitare etiam oportet ne supinus dormiat: which Morgagni prefers. Ep. i. p.27.

34. At such seasons as it returns.) I have here followed the correction offered by Morgagni his for hi which last would manifestly destroy our author’s meaning, as may appear from the general sense of the whole sentence—Instead of the present translation it would be, by those upon whom it returns.

35. Sarcophagus, or flesh-eating.) This is found at Assos, a city of Troas. Dead bodies interred in it are said to be consumed in forty days, bones and every thing, except the teeth. Plin. l. xxxvi. c. 17.

36. Asian stone.) Dioscorides says this ought to be of the colour of the pumice, spongy, light, and easily friable. Lib. v. c. 916.

37. Acopon, according to the derivation of the word, signifies something that relieves lassitude, which was rubbed upon the joints.—Our author exhibits some forms of them lib. v. cap. 24. where their consistence varies.—P. Ægineta for acopa orders four parts of oil to one of wax, lib. vii. cap. 17.—In later ages the word was used in a more extensive sense, for compositions of the consistence of oil, or as a liniment even when the intention was not to relieve fatigue.

38. Most agreeable to his humour.) That is, Celsus supposes a man in good health, who is his own master, to be confined to no laws, lib. i. cap. i. but upon account of a preceding illness he must return to that gradually.