Catalogue of the vegetable production of the Presidency of Bombay : including a list of the drugs sold in bazars of western India / compiled by G.C.M. Birdwood.

Date:
1865
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Catalogue of the vegetable production of the Presidency of Bombay : including a list of the drugs sold in bazars of western India / compiled by G.C.M. Birdwood. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    72/518 (page 22)
    Bdellium or Matlaleon. -But the musk region of the Himalayas may be as appropriately described as compassed by the Indus, as Sindh and the Punjab. The association of Bdolach with gold points also to Thibet. Nothing is known of the locality of Havilath independently of the Pishon. So much for the positive argument for Bdolach being Musk. With regard to the negative :—neither the descriptions of the Bible, Dioscorides, nor Pliny in the least resemble Googul, while all indicate Musk. Pliny gives Bactriana as the country of Bdellium ; but says it also comes from Arabia and Media, the Median being called peraticum (nepara yijs-) or from the uttermost parts of the earth. The musk deer is not only found in the Himalayas but in Siberia, Tonguin, and Cochin China, and a substance analogous to Musk (Hyraceum '!) is brought to Bombay by Zanzibar merchants. Googid, however, is found not only in Northern India, but in Arabia; nevertheless, I am of opinion that Plimy never meant Googul by Bdellium, and that probably his Indian Myrrh and Scordastum refer to the modern Bdellium of India. It is strange that although familiar with Castoreum, no ancient writers mention Musk unequivocally ; iEtius (a.d. 550), being the first (Pereira) who describes it. The etymology of musk (fido-xot) is not determined. The connexion of the onyx stone with bedellium in Genesis (ch. ii. v. 11) renders it necessary to remark that the word onyx is used in another sense in Scripture, accord- ing to Calmet, than that of the stone Shohem. Thus the word Shecheleth is translated by the LXX. as onyx (ocu£, a nail) meaning the celebrated odoriferous shell of the ancients; although others understand by it Ladanum (the balsam of Cistus creticus, W.; C. ladaniferus, W.; &c.) and Bdellium. Pliny says of Bactrian Bdellium that it is sinning and dry and covered witli numerous white spots resembling the finger nails. And such Bdellium would appear to have been the jSStXXi; ovu£ of Damocritus, an obscure medical writer quoted by Saracenus in his Scholia in Dioscoridis, and of Galen as quoted by Salmasius in his Pliniante Exercitationes. Salmasius states that from the Greek words fmbihKuv, paKaxr], the Arab Molochil (Mukul) is derived ; which, if true, would lessen the force of Lassen's arguments in favour of the Bdellium of the Bible being Musk, if they were etymological only. Bochart asserts that the Bdolach of the Bible is neither a stone nor bdellium, but a shell, genus Unio. Hooker has called the Indian Bdellium tree B. Mokul, but I have not the means to determine satisfactorily whether this is a new plant, or a new name simply of the long-known tree placed at the head of this article. Drury states that B. Mokul is distinct from B. roxburghii. Stocks states that, in Sindh, B. pubescens also yields Googul. In the Himalayas the Juniperus religiosa (Royle), and in the Bhore Ghat Cana- rium strictum (Rox.) are called Googul. The Googoola of the Telingoos is Bostvellia glabra (W. et A.) Of the other kinds of modern Bdellium, African is obtained from B. africatium, the Nioutout of Senegambia, and Cerardiafurcata (Compositse); Egyptian from Hyphane thebaica (Palmse) ; and Sicilian from Daucus gummifer (Umbelliferse). See also Gums and Resins.