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Dioscurides
Pedanius Dioscorides ( grc-gre, Πεδάνιος Διοσκουρίδης, ; 40–90 AD), “the father of pharmacognosy”, was a Greek physician, pharmacologist, botanist, and author of ''De materia medica'' (, On Medical Material) —a 5-volume Greek encyclopedia about herbal medicine and related medicinal substances (a pharmacopeia), that was widely read for more than 1,500 years. For almost two millennia Dioscorides was regarded as the most prominent writer on plants and plant drugs. Life A native of Anazarbus, Cilicia, Asia Minor, Dioscorides likely studied medicine nearby at the school in Tarsus, which had a pharmacological emphasis, and he dedicated his medical books to Laecanius Arius, a medical practitioner there. Though he writes he lived a "soldier's life" or "soldier-like life", his pharmacopeia refers almost solely to plants found in the Greek-speaking eastern Mediterranean, making it likely that he served in campaigns, or travelled in a civilian capacity, less ...
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De Materia Medica (Dioscorides)
(Latin name for the Greek work , , both meaning "On Medical Material") is a pharmacopoeia of medicinal plants and the medicines that can be obtained from them. The five-volume work was written between 50 and 70 CE by Pedanius Dioscorides, a Greek physician in the Roman army. It was widely read for more than 1,500 years until supplanted by revised herbals in the Renaissance, making it one of the longest-lasting of all natural history and pharmacology books. The work describes many drugs known to be effective, including aconite, aloes, colocynth, colchicum, henbane, opium and squill. In all, about 600 plants are covered, along with some animals and mineral substances, and around 1000 medicines made from them. was circulated as illustrated manuscripts, copied by hand, in Greek, Latin and Arabic throughout the mediaeval period. From the 16th century on, Dioscorides' text was translated into Italian, German, Spanish, and French, and in 1655 into English. It formed the b ...
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De Materia Medica
(Latin name for the Greek work , , both meaning "On Medical Material") is a pharmacopoeia of medicinal plants and the medicines that can be obtained from them. The five-volume work was written between 50 and 70 CE by Pedanius Dioscorides, a Greek physician in the Roman army. It was widely read for more than 1,500 years until supplanted by revised herbals in the Renaissance, making it one of the longest-lasting of all natural history and pharmacology books. The work describes many drugs known to be effective, including aconite, aloes, colocynth, colchicum, henbane, opium and squill. In all, about 600 plants are covered, along with some animals and mineral substances, and around 1000 medicines made from them. was circulated as illustrated manuscripts, copied by hand, in Greek, Latin and Arabic throughout the mediaeval period. From the 16th century on, Dioscorides' text was translated into Italian, German, Spanish, and French, and in 1655 into English. It formed the ...
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Juliana Anicia Codex
The Vienna Dioscurides or Vienna Dioscorides is an early 6th-century Byzantine Greek illuminated manuscript of an even earlier 1st century AD work, ''De materia medica'' (Περὶ ὕλης ἰατρικῆς : Perì hylēs iatrikēs in the original Greek) by Pedanius Dioscorides in uncial script. It is an important and rare example of a late antique scientific text. After residing in Constantinople for just over a thousand years, the text passed to the Holy Roman Emperor in Vienna in the 1500s, a century after the city fell to the Ottomans. The 491 vellum folios measure 37 by 30 cm and contain more than 400 pictures of animals and plants, most done in a naturalistic style. In addition to the text by Dioscorides, the manuscript has appended to it, the ''Carmen de herbis'' attributed to Rufus, a paraphrase of an ornithological treatise by a certain Dionysius, usually identified with Dionysius of Philadelphia, and a paraphrase of Nicander's treatise on the treatment of snak ...
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Vienna Dioscurides
The Vienna Dioscurides or Vienna Dioscorides is an early 6th-century Byzantine Greek illuminated manuscript of an even earlier 1st century AD work, '' De materia medica'' (Περὶ ὕλης ἰατρικῆς : Perì hylēs iatrikēs in the original Greek) by Pedanius Dioscorides in uncial script. It is an important and rare example of a late antique scientific text. After residing in Constantinople for just over a thousand years, the text passed to the Holy Roman Emperor in Vienna in the 1500s, a century after the city fell to the Ottomans. The 491 vellum folios measure 37 by 30 cm and contain more than 400 pictures of animals and plants, most done in a naturalistic style. In addition to the text by Dioscorides, the manuscript has appended to it, the ''Carmen de herbis'' attributed to Rufus, a paraphrase of an ornithological treatise by a certain Dionysius, usually identified with Dionysius of Philadelphia, and a paraphrase of Nicander's treatise on the treatment of ...
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Herbalism
Herbal medicine (also herbalism) is the study of pharmacognosy and the use of medicinal plants, which are a basis of traditional medicine. With worldwide research into pharmacology, some herbal medicines have been translated into modern remedies, such as the anti-malarial group of drugs called artemisinin isolated from '' Artemisia annua'', a herb that was known in Chinese medicine to treat fever. There is limited scientific evidence for the safety and efficacy of plants used in 21st century herbalism, which generally does not provide standards for purity or dosage. The scope of herbal medicine commonly includes fungal and bee products, as well as minerals, shells and certain animal parts. Herbal medicine is also called phytomedicine or phytotherapy. Paraherbalism describes alternative and pseudoscientific practices of using unrefined plant or animal extracts as unproven medicines or health-promoting agents. Paraherbalism relies on the belief that preserving various ...
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Mount Athos
Mount Athos (; el, Ἄθως, ) is a mountain in the distal part of the eponymous Athos peninsula and site of an important centre of Eastern Orthodox monasticism in northeastern Greece. The mountain along with the respective part of the peninsula have been governed as the monastic community of Mount Athos, an autonomous region within the Hellenic Republic, ecclesiastically under the direct jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, while the remainder of the peninsula forms part of the Aristotelis municipality. Mount Athos has been inhabited since ancient times and is known for its long Christian presence and historical monastic traditions, which date back to at least AD 800 and the Byzantine era. Because of its long history of religious importance, the well-preserved agrarian architecture within the monasteries, and the preservation of the flora and fauna around the mountain, Mount Athos was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1988. In modern Gr ...
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Dacian Language
Dacian is an extinct language, generally believed to be Indo-European, that was spoken in the Carpathian region in antiquity. In the 1st century, it was probably the predominant language of the ancient regions of Dacia and Moesia and possibly of some surrounding regions. The language was extinct by the 4th century AD. While there is general agreement among scholars that Dacian was an Indo-European language, there are divergent opinions about its place within the IE family: * Dacian was a dialect of the extinct Thracian language, or vice versa, e. g . and . * Dacian was a language distinct from Thracian but closely related to it, belonging to the same branch of the Indo-European family (a " Thraco-Dacian", or "Daco-Thracian" branch has been theorised by some linguists). * Dacian, Thracian, the Baltic languages (Duridanov also adds Pelasgian) formed a distinct branch of Indo-European, e.g. Schall (1974), Duridanov (1976), Radulescu (1987) and Mayer (1996).Schall H., Sud ...
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Thracian Language
The Thracian language () is an extinct and poorly attested language, spoken in ancient times in Southeast Europe by the Thracians. The linguistic affinities of the Thracian language are poorly understood, but it is generally agreed that it was an Indo-European language with satem features. A contemporary, neighboring language, Dacian is usually regarded as closely related to Thracian. However, there is insufficient evidence with respect to either language to ascertain the nature of this relationship. The point at which Thracian became extinct is a matter of dispute. However, it is generally accepted that Thracian was still in use in the 6th century AD: Antoninus of Piacenza wrote in 570 that there was a monastery in the Sinai, at which the monks spoke Greek, Latin, Syriac, Egyptian, and Bessian – a Thracian dialect. Other theories about Thracian remain controversial. A classification put forward by some linguists, such as Harvey Mayer, suggests that Thracian (and ...
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Dioscorea
''Dioscorea'' is a genus of over 600 species of flowering plants in the family Dioscoreaceae, native throughout the tropical and warm temperate regions of the world. The vast majority of the species are tropical, with only a few species extending into temperate climates. It was named by the monk Charles Plumier after the ancient Greek physician and botanist Dioscorides. Description Wild Yam (''Dioscorea'') is a vine that is invasive, deciduous, and herbaceous. This species is native to Asia, though, in the U.S., it is commonly found in Florida. They can grow over in length. Wild yams are an important crop, as they have been used to prevent menstrual cramps, stomach cramps, and general pain for centuries. During the 1950s scientists found that the roots of wild yams contained diosgenin which is a plant-based estrogen; diosgenin is hypothesized to aid in chemical defense against herbivores. This was used to create the first birth control pills during the 60s. In addition, some ...
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Mandrake (plant)
''Mandragora officinarum'' is the type species of the plant genus '' Mandragora'' in the nightshade family Solanaceae. It is often known as mandrake, although this name is also used for other plants. , sources differed significantly in the species they use for ''Mandragora'' plants native to the Mediterranean region. The main species found around the Mediterranean is called '' Mandragora autumnalis'', the autumn mandrake. In a broader circumscription, all the plants native to the regions around the Mediterranean Sea are placed in ''M. officinarum'', which thus includes ''M. autumnalis''. The names autumn mandrake and Mediterranean mandrake are then used. Whatever the circumscription, ''Mandragora officinarum'' is a perennial herbaceous plant with ovate leaves arranged in a rosette, a thick upright root, often branched, and bell-shaped flowers followed by yellow or orange berries. Because mandrakes contain deliriant hallucinogenic tropane alkaloids (atropine, scopolami ...
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Yam (vegetable)
Yam is the common name for some plant species in the genus '' Dioscorea'' (family Dioscoreaceae) that form edible tubers. Yams are perennial herbaceous vines cultivated for the consumption of their starchy tubers in many temperate and tropical regions, especially in West Africa, South America and the Caribbean, Asia, and Oceania. The tubers themselves, also called "yams", come in a variety of forms owing to numerous cultivars and related species. Yams were independently domesticated on three different continents: Africa ('' Dioscorea rotundata''), Asia ('' Dioscorea alata''), and the Americas ('' Dioscorea trifida''). Etymology The name "yam" appears to derive from Portuguese ''inhame'' or Canarian (Spain) ''ñame'', which derived from West African languages during trade. However in both languages, this name commonly refers to the taro plant (''Colocasia esculenta'') from the genus '' Colocasia'', as opposed to '' Dioscorea''. The main derivations borrow f ...
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