poisons-msg - 3/26/04 Medieval poisons. NOTE: See also the files: poisons-art, p-medicine-msg, herbs-msg, spices-msg, p-herbals-msg, mandrake-art, rue-msg, Pest-Control-art. ************************************************************************ NOTICE - This file is a collection of various messages having a common theme that I have collected from my reading of the various computer networks. Some messages date back to 1989, some may be as recent as yesterday. This file is part of a collection of files called Stefan's Florilegium. These files are available on the Internet at: http://www.florilegium.org I have done a limited amount of editing. Messages having to do with separate topics were sometimes split into different files and sometimes extraneous information was removed. For instance, the message IDs were removed to save space and remove clutter. The comments made in these messages are not necessarily my viewpoints. I make no claims as to the accuracy of the information given by the individual authors. Please respect the time and efforts of those who have written these messages. The copyright status of these messages is unclear at this time. If information is published from these messages, please give credit to the originator(s). Thank you, Mark S. Harris AKA: THLord Stefan li Rous Stefan at florilegium.org ************************************************************************ From: corliss at hal.PHysics.wayne.EDU (David J. Corliss) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Poisons Date: 12 Jul 1994 10:41:30 -0400 Organization: the internet Mikjal Annarbjorn writes: > I'd have thought that digitalis (nightshade) would be another "fast-acting" > poison. Could it be produced in quantity in period? Gentle Lord, You have confused two _distinct_ poisons. Both were known in period. The plant known as digitalis in Latin, on account of it's finger-shaped flowers, was known as foke's glove (foke = a kind of sprite) in English. This name has since become foxglove, the present English name for this ornamental plant. It is found in many gardens and contains four alkaloids, all of which are toxic. The plant is deadly. It is also grown for medicinal purposes, the alkaloids being useful medicines in tiny, accurately measured, and prescribed doses. This is the source of the alkaloid digitalis, so beneficial in cases of heart disease. In the Middle Ages and Renaisance, it was given to treat edema without knowledge of the connection between edema and heart disease. Nightshade, properly speaking, is the name of a family of plants including potatoes and tomatoes in addition to deadly nightshade, the namesake of the group. This plant is also known as belladonna, or "beautiful lady": a tincture of the leaves was put into the eyes so that the pupils would dilate and make the eyes appear larger. This plant yields a dangerous narcotic and hallucinogenic substance, also known as belladonna, responsible for the dilation of the pupils. In all but the smallest quantities, it may be fatal. Other well known toxic plants used in period included monkshood, henbane, and mistletoe. Beorthwine of Grafham Wood From: ayotte at milo.NOdak.EDU (Robert Arthur Ayotte) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Poisons Date: 12 Jul 1994 20:12:01 -0400 Organization: North Dakota State University ACM, Fargo ND In article <9407121432.AA07172 at hal.physics.wayne.edu> you wrote: : Nightshade, properly speaking, is the name of a family of plants including : potatoes and tomatoes in addition to deadly nightshade, the namesake of the : group. This plant is also known as belladonna, or "beautiful lady": a tincture : of the leaves was put into the eyes so that the pupils would dilate and make : the eyes appear larger. This plant yields a dangerous narcotic and : hallucinogenic substance, also known as belladonna, responsible for the : dilation of the pupils. In all but the smallest quantities, it may be fatal. Actually that family is known as Solanaceae formally (see Linnaeus). The berry is part used to make both the poison and the dye. When unripe the berry has a protective alkaloid poison (not narcotic or hallucinogenic) that can be extracted but is known for it's tasteless ness but is very slow working and can take repeated applications to be effective, and it leaves a notable sign on the body. Like many plants the toxins change from different stages of growth. The RIPE berries are harmeless, and actually quite good to eat. The problem comes when you get a few green berries mixed in with the ripe. There was a town that had been growing them and called deadly nightshade "wonderberry" and was the favorite local berry for pies and preserves. Also the dye for eye came from the berry, it turns the white of the eye purple and the residual alkaloids do tend to dialate the eye as well. Since these dyes were from the ripe berry they were not poison, but could cause irritation and swelling of the bloodvessels in the eye making it look quite bloodshot. : Other well known toxic plants used in period included monkshood, henbane, and : mistletoe. : Beorthwine of Grafham Wood Oh, and the Romans were quite advanced in herbalistic poisons. I think it was wolfsbane that was used to kill Germanicus by his son Caligula. Of note they also had many remidies for these poisons as well. Mistletoe is one of the most deadly listed here. Horace of Northshield From: RONDEAUB at ropt1.am.wyeth.COM (Ben Rondeau) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Poisons.... Date: 14 Jul 1994 14:13:34 -0400 Organization: the internet Good day to the folks of the Rialto: I've been following the 'Poisons' thread here, and would like to make a comment before anyone goes out and tries to grow some of the plants mentioned (belladonna, henbane, foxglove, etc.) RESEARCH YOUR LOCAL AND STATE LAWS FIRST!!! Also, some plants contain alkaloids that are on the Schedule of controlled substances, and possession of ANY amount of these plants can lead to prosecution. Some states have laws against the cultivation of ANY "dangerous" plants, so please.....check the regs first. A lot of these plants are sold as ornamentals, ie, you can buy foxglove at the local K-Mart here in Northern NY and castor plants (from whence comes castor oil and ricinine, a powerful poison) from the local Agway, so , in an area that permits them, they can be grown. (Hopefully, only for their curiousity value!!!) Addition to the list of poisonous plants...how about bittersweet nightshade? This little wonder grows wild here along streambanks and is easy to find, and just about all of the plant is toxic...... Ben Rondeau rondeau at ropt1.am.wyeth.com From: gbrent at rschp1.anu.EDU.AU (Geoffrey Brent) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Period poisons Date: 15 Jul 1994 01:43:36 -0400 Organization: the internet One toxin that was certainly present in mediaeval times, and more deadly than any mentioned so far (by dose) : botulin. Nasty, too. It might be a bit hard to find which food contained it, though. Unless you had a whole lot of servants nibble on things, and note who dropped dead of it. -- Geoffrey the Quiet (gbrent at rsc.anu.edu.au) From: gbrent at rschp1.anu.EDU.AU (Geoffrey Brent) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Fast acting poisons ? Date: 11 Jul 1994 01:30:20 -0400 Organization: the internet I can think of one that might be available. The good old favourite, cyanide. Present in apple pits, apricot kernels, etc. etc. in significant quantities. (Ever noticed how apple pits taste a little like almonds ?) I suspect it would be quite possible to extract enough HCN from something of the sort to poison someone. (The reason apple pits and apricot kernels contain the stuff: not a lot of creatures make a habit of eating apricot kernels.) -- Geoffrey the Quiet (gbrent at rsc.anu.edu.au) From: doconnor at sedona.intel.com (Dennis O'Connor) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Fast acting poisons ? Date: 14 Jul 94 07:54:38 Organization: not much. gbrent at rschp1.anu.EDU.AU (Geoffrey Brent) writes: ] I can think of one that might be available. The good old favourite, ] cyanide. Present in apple pits, apricot kernels, etc. etc. in ] significant quantities. (Ever noticed how apple pits taste a little like ] almonds ?) I suspect it would be quite possible to extract enough HCN ] from something of the sort to poison someone. When my wife was young, her mother would make wild cherry (I think) wine. According to my wife, a layer of cyanide-rich liquid would accumulate on top of the wine, which her mother would simply skim off. -- Dennis O'Connor doconnor at sedona.intel.com Intel i960(R) Microprocessor Division Solely responsible for what I do. From: darkstar at u.washington.edu (Alden Hackmann) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Digitalis Date: 12 Jul 1994 19:07:13 GMT Organization: University of Washington WISH at uriacc.uri.EDU writes: >> Michael Chance >> ... >> I'd have thought that digitalis (nightshade) would be another >> "fast-acting" poison. Could it be produced in quantity in period? >Purely from memory; Purple foxglove produces enough digitalis > to kill livestock, so I'd be surprised if people > could survive it... (Isn't digitalis in small > doses used to treat dropsy? ) Yes, but nightshade and foxglove are different plants. Foxglove (Digitalus purpura) produces digitalis, which is used therapeutically but is quite toxic: the margin between a useful dose and one that kills may be as low as a factor of 2. The modern drug, digoxin, is chemically modified so the therapeutic index is a little wider, but it's still quite dangerous. You should wash your hands after handling foxglove. Deadly nightshade produces a different toxin, an anti-cholinergic which acts on the nervous system. Caveat: It's been a long time since I learned all this stuff, and I don't have my Goodman and Gilman nearby to check. Alden From: jeffs at math.bu.EDU (Jeff Suzuki) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: botulin Date: 28 Jul 1994 20:14:02 -0400 Organization: the internet >One toxin that was certainly present in mediaeval times, and more deadly >than any mentioned so far (by dose) : botulin. Nasty, too. Hmmm...hard to figure where you'd get it. Doesn't C. Botulinus require a vacuum to produce its organic poison? (Granted, there are some unusual circumstances I've heard of...including one that involved a layer of fat forming a hermetic seal over a vat of soup...SCA cooks beware...) OK, I missed the original post, but off the top of my head the available medieval poisons I can think of are: mercury, lead and any number of other heavy metals (slow acting ones with symptoms well known in period); various cyanides from things like peach pits etc. ("Prussian Blue" is good ol' HCN, though I don't know whether that particular type of dye is period); lots of nasty organometallic compounds like lead acetate ("sugar of lead" with all the really interesting whodunit possibilities it implies for period mysteries...); and ergot. Ergot may be the most interesting case...if rye infected with ergot is baked into a loaf, the LSD will survive the cooking process...then you feed it to the victim. Then you call the authorities and report a witch... William the Alchymist (Now, where did I put that blowfish that I got sent...) From: Joyce Miller Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: botulin Date: 29 Jul 1994 18:48:52 GMT Organization: Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research In article <9407290011.AA00193 at math.bu.edu> Jeff Suzuki, jeffs at math.bu.EDU writes: >Ergot may be the most interesting case...if rye infected with ergot is >baked into a loaf, the LSD will survive the cooking process...then you >feed it to the victim. Then you call the authorities and report a >witch... > >William the Alchymist Or you report a dead person. Ergot contains the alkoloids ergonovine and ergotomine, both of which are composed of lysergic acid, the precursor of LSD (Lysergic acid diethylamide, which has to be synthisized in the laboratory). Both alkoloids have very powerful effects -- burning sensations in the extremities, contriction of blood vessels (leading to gangrene in severe cases), hallucinations, spontaneous abortions, and culvulsions leading to death. "Saint Anthony's Fire" or "Holy Fire" was a common disease in the Middle Ages, particularly in France, where tens of thousands were killed by it. Many victims visited the shrine of St. Anthony in Egypt, and were cured -- not surprising, since they probably ate non-contaminated grain along the way. Although in 1597 people began to associate the grain fungus and the disease, outbreaks of ergotism continued well into this century; in 1926 in the Ukraine, in the first few decades of this century in New York, Ohio and Kansas, and most recently, in a French village in 1951. A fictionalized account of that outbreak was given in the book "The Day of St. Anthony;s Fire_, by John G. Fuller (1968). -- Ursula/Joyce ======================================================= Joyce Miller jmiller at genome.wi.mit.edu Whitehead Institute / M.I.T. Center for Genome Research 617-252-1914 (phone) 617-252-1902 (FAX) ======================================================= From: gbrent at rschp1.anu.EDU.AU (Geoffrey Brent) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Sausage poisoning Date: 29 Jul 1994 02:14:10 -0400 Organization: the internet Botulism doesn't require a vacuum; vacuums are rather hard to find in the natural environment. What it does require is an environment without free oxygen. (Oxygen is actually quite nasty to many critters; for those that haven't evolved to cope with it, it's about as nasty as a lungful of chlorine gas.) As someone mentioned earlier, sausage interiors are one of these places - the name "botulism" derives from the Latin for "sausage". As for poisoning with straight mercury, I really wouldn't bother. It's not very toxic (to eat; don't breathe the vapour) until it's in some sort of compound. If you swallow pure mercury, most of it goes straight through you (don't try this at home, darlings.) Besides, the wretched stuff keeps rolling out of the food... If I were a poisoner in period (alas, I was born four hundred years too late, with the right outlook on life but the wrong morals) these are some of the things I'd try : Cyanide from peach pits etc. I'd want to be using a nice big dose. Cyanide's fast enough that people will connect the poisoning with the food pretty quickly, and if they aren't dead after all that things get messy. A whole heap of foxglove mixed into their food; I think heating would denature it (not sure) so I'd have to just mix it in something without cooking. Arsenic (I think this was in period) over a period of time. Rent-A-Snake. Actually, Rent-Lots-Of-Snakes. One snake bite is by no means guaranteed fatal, even from something really deadly (and all the deadliest snakes are _ours_, and out of the SCA's area.) Perhaps, collect the venom and evaporate some of the moisture content (without heating), then accidentally scratch them with it. Rather dodgy, difficult to do without being caught. Besides, many snake venoms leave a very obvious mark where they were introduced and take too long to work - the victim would talk. "Uncle Charles, have a mushroom !" Not called Destroying Angel because they have halos and wings. Or, if I was feeling particularly nasty : Find ye a rabid dog. Get your servants to capture it. (lucky them.) If it's dead, carefully collect saliva, blood or whatever. Better yet, get your servants to do it. Then spread it on a chunk of meat and feed it to your enemy's dog. Better still, chop the whole rabid dog up and feed it to his dog. Or invite him to dinner, and put a little bit of raw meat in his food, and hope. (Steak tartare ? :-) Or scratch him with something dipped in the stuff (Oops, must be more careful with that knife. I might have killed you.) If the dog's still alive, you'll probably want to kill it anyway. In period, infection would have invariably lead to a rather horrible death. (There is only one recorded case of a human surviving rabies infection once it took hold, and that was with full medical aid. Rabies kills 30 000 people a year now, in 1994.) Of course, it all depends on what you want to achieve. For sudden death, cyanide's the only period poison I can think of, and a hired goon with a crossbow is a lot better. Besides, why bother ? You don't want to make it too easy to work out when poisoning occurred. Far better to use something slow-acting, which could be mistaken for natural causes. Sadly, a lot of the best animal poisons are Australian. That's your tough luck. I doubt I would have used botulism, not so much because it would be too difficult but because I wouldn't have known how to cultivate it, knowing nothing about how diseases worked (on the other hand, I think most people in an area with rabies would know how to catch it.) These suggestions are only for informational purposes. Do NOT play with any of these poisons. -- Geoffrey the Quiet (gbrent at rsc.anu.edu.au) From: gbrent at rschp1.anu.EDU.AU (Geoffrey Brent) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Period poisons - oleander Date: 1 Aug 1994 01:02:42 -0400 Organization: the internet Oleander is certainly poisonous, as is the smoke. The problem is, from what I know of it I suspect it would be a little inconvenient and unreliable. You see, when you're choosing your poisons, there are several things you want out of them. i) Untraceability. If someone dies in the middle of a meal from blowfish poisoning, and you own the only blowfish in town, people are going to be suspicious. ii) Reliability. If you can't be guaranteed that someone will die from your attempt, you could be in trouble. If they realise someone's trying to kill them they will take more precautions and look for suspects. Poisoning's a very suspicious way to die in any case, and if you leave someone not-quite-dead there will be even more of an attempt to find out who did it. iii) Convenience/ease of introduction. The ideal poison resembles food or has such a small lethal dose that you can hide it in their meal anyway. It doesn't taste too strong, and it isn't destroyed by cooking or whatever you do to the food after poisoning it. iv) Syptoms should resemble some "natural" cause of death; they should also happen long enough after eating that people don't trace the exact meal. (This is where systematic poisoning with arsenic or heavy metals comes into its own.) Oleander would fall down on ii and iii, I think. While it is certainly a danger to animals and children, the dose is still far from minute (especially to an adult.) I am not a big enough idiot to have tried it, but I suspect the taste would be quite strong. (It's better for the plant to deter you than to kill you at the cost of all its leaves.) Being a reasonably complex poison (sorry, don't know the details, but most vegetable poisons are) it would probably be decomposed by cooking. Another problem with organic poisons, especially the more complicated ones, is that tolerances vary enough to give you the occasional nasty surprise. "That leaf salad was heavenly ! What _do_ you put in it ?" From the above list, I'd be most in favour of something like destroying angel mushrooms. If you mix bits of them in with normal mushrooms, you can't really tell that there's something wrong. (If you use a brightly coloured fungus, like the one with the pretty red spots, just use the insides and destroy the outside. The insides of mushrooms look much the same no matter what they're from.) The poison is so toxic that reliability is no problem (tolerance or no, you're in a lot of trouble.) It would probably be seen as poisoning, because the effects are more acute than most diseases, but it could have just been an accident - you know how difficult it is to tell with mushrooms... And it's not hard to introduce - just offer some chopped mushrooms. You don't have to cook them. If you want a really long delay in period, you really have to accept some unreliability. In such a case, I'd be thinking more of biological agents than chemical - as I mentioned, rabies takes a fair while before it takes effect. It's also quite nasty, if you're feeling vengeful. (Geoffrey the Quiet is just a wanderer with no real reason to poison people, although the subject does interest him somewhat. Geoffrey Brent knows more about poisons than an honest lad should, and requests that you don't try any of these, even in fun. Lethal doses deliberately omitted.) -- Geoffrey the Quiet (gbrent at rsc.anu.edu.au) From: jjordan at yorick.umd.edu (James L. Jordan) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Period poisons - oleander Date: 4 Aug 1994 13:05:48 GMT Organization: University of Maryland, College Park I agree, the death angel mushroom would be an ideal way to off someone. the toxin actually destroys the victim's liver. The demise is within a few days, with all sorts of symptoms that could be msitaken for a natural cause. From: irgenwer at ix.netcom.com (Kate was here) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: White Lead Date: Tue, 04 Feb 1997 22:17:48 GMT Organization: Quahaug Cannery david.razler at worldnet.att.net (David M. Razler) posted: >3) One lead compound misidentified in a post is lead acetate, Pb(C2H2O2)2 or >"sugar of lead" which tastes great, is less filling and kills you. It was used >in some times/places in the Roman Empire and into period as a wine sweetener. Wow! I didn't know that. That's cool! (Though my favorite poison used in food is still orpiment, As2S3 - used in medieval and renaissance Italy as a preservative for shipping wine long distances. A little arsenic with your burgundy, mi'lord?) Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1998 11:13:14 +1000 From: The Cheshire Cat Subject: SC - Deadly Datura >I believe that Datura was used as an ordeal poison by native americans. In ancient Egypt too, Datura was used as a poison. Very popular with assassins and such like. (I'm begginning to realise an alarming trend with my knowledge, I know more anout wierd potions and poisons than I do cooking.) - -Sianan Date: Sun, 21 Mar 1999 18:07:31 -0500 From: rmhowe To: sca-arts at raven.cc.ukans.edu Subject: Herbs, and Poisons, etc. Oh My! http://www.erols.com/cosby/diana.html A Writer's page. Check Out Where these links lead you. Magnus From: "Terry Decker" To: Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] ivory reworked Date: Mon, 26 Nov 2001 21:18:05 -0600 >Ok. And what are "bezoar stones"? >Stefan A bezoar stone is a hard mass of indigestible material such as hair or fibers found in the stomachs or intestines of animals. Apparently they are fairly common in ruminants and humans. Bezoar stones are believed to have magic properties and act as a antidote to poison. Bezoar appears to derive from the Middle English "bezear" from the Old French "bezahar" possibly from the Arabic "bazahr" which derives from the Persian "padzahr" meaning "poison antidote." Bear Date: Wed, 9 Jul 2003 22:21:39 -0500 From: "Terry Decker" Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Re Request for info on period poisons To: "Cooks within the SCA" Seems to me Amanita phalloides (death angel, death cap, death cup mushroom) was used in at least one period murder. And arsenic was described as an element by Albertus Magnus in the 13th Century. Socrates was executed with an infusion of poison hemlock (Conium maculatum), so that was certainly known in Shakespeare's time. Snake venom, with or without the snake, is another possibility, but other than Cleopatra's (apochryphal?) suicide, I can't think of an occurence Bear Date: Thu, 10 Jul 2003 06:17:01 -0500 From: "Terry Decker" Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Re Request for info on period poisons To: "Cooks within the SCA" Thought of another one after I staggered off to bed. Belladonna or deadly nightshade (Atropa belladonna). Bear Date: Thu, 10 Jul 2003 10:01:24 -0400 From: "a5foil" Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Re Request for info on period poisons To: "Cooks within the SCA" How about aconite -- monkshood? Though looking at Grieve's Herbal, she says it was considered an antidote against other poisons -- as well as being known as venomous and deadly. Cynara Date: Thu, 10 Jul 2003 09:50:09 -0500 From: "Aurore" Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Re Request for info on period poisons To: "Cooks within the SCA" Don't forget Foxglove. It has it's good uses but used in a bad way, it does the deed. Aurore Date: Thu, 10 Jul 2003 10:30:21 -0500 From: "Decker, Terry D." Subject: [Sca-cooks] Re Request for info on period poisons To: "'sca-cooks at ansteorra.org'" Other poisons I have thought of, opium (from Papaver somniferum, opium poppy), aconite (from Aconitum napellus, monkshood or wolfsbane), digitalis (from Digitalis purpurea, foxglove), hyoscyamine (from Hyoscyamus niger, hensbane), and hellebore (most of the genus Helleborus). For a period source on poisons which is contemporary to Shakespeare, Try Giambattista della Porta's "Magia Naturalis" (1558). He also appears as Giovanni Battista Porta or della Porta. Transcripts of the 1558 Latin text and the 1658 English translation are webbed at: http://members.tscnet.com/pages/omard1/jportat3.html This text also contains a section on cookery, so it is of interest to this list beyond it's poisons. Bear Date: Thu, 10 Jul 2003 12:34:25 -0400 From: "Sayyida Halima al-Shafi'i of Raven's Cove" Subject: [Sca-cooks] period poisons... To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org Let us not forget hemlock... Halima al-Shafi'i Stronghold of Raven's Cove Kingdom of Atlantia Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2003 18:33:03 -0400 From: Morgana Abbey Subject: [Sca-cooks] Re: period poisons... To: Sca-cooks at ansteorra.org A friend of mine taught a class some years ago about poisons. I do not have his sources to cite, but here is the wildest poisoning method he found. From the North of Scotland: Catch a sea snake (yeah, one of those nasty chase-you-up-on-shore critters). Milk it for venom. Mix the venom with oil--carefully as the venom is a neurotoxin and therefore --- Put the mixture inside your enemy's gloves. Venom seeps through skin. Enemy dies. You party. Morgana Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2003 19:44:53 -0500 From: "Terry Decker" Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] period poisons... To: "Cooks within the SCA" >>> Here is a web site of deaths by unnatural causes in illuminations, it contains a section on poisoning. Unfortunately they don't list the poison being used. http://www.kb.nl/kb/manuscripts/highlights/31E23_uk.html Cecily <<< Since the title is Socrates drinks from the poisoned cup, the poison is an infusion of poison hemlock (Conium maculatum). The execution of Socrates is recorded by Plato, one of Socrates's students. Bear Date: Mon, 14 Jul 2003 08:53:30 -0600 From: "Eden Blacksmith" Subject: [Sca-cooks] period poisons To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org from my files on posion.....hope it has something you need. Eden Atenveldt http://members.tripod.com/~Prof_Anil_Aggrawal/poiso001.html http://www.lehigh.edu/~jahb/herbs/WomenMed.html http://www.portfolio.mvm.ed.ac.uk/studentwebs/session2/group12/middle.htm http://webexhibits.org/pigments/indiv/color/greens3.html http://www.florilegium.org/files/UNCAT/poisons-art.html http://www.castellum.freewebspace.com/pestcont.html http://www.portfolio.mvm.ed.ac.uk/studentwebs/session2/group12/renaissance.htm http://www.skell.org/SKELL/plants4.htm http://britishexpats.com/arch/44/2001/4/22353 (questionable resource ...but, cute) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/glaber-1000.html http://www.erowid.org/library/books/poisons_of.shtml http://www.botanical.com/botanical/mgmh/mgmh.html Edited by Mark S. Harris poisons-msg