Pliny, the Elder

Egyptian papyms bonded with a starchy adhesive has been dated to 3500—4000 BC. Pliny the Elder (23—74 ad) described Egyptian use of wheat starch modified by boiling in vinegar to produce a smooth surface for papyms documents. 

In some of his work, Pliny the Elder (24—79 Ad) wrote of the heating of wine with flames. In the tenth century, the Persian philosopher Avicenna (980—1037 ad) described a distillation stUl. Magister Salemus wrote about "aqua ardens" around 1150 AD. The German alchemist and philosopher, Albertus Magnus (1200—1280 ad), studied wine distillation, made improvements, and wrote a manuscript on the production of aqua ardens. 

In Ancient Rome, Pliny the Elder (c. a.d. 23-79) dedicated 37 volumes of Natural History to the emperor Titus. In the last of these books, dealing with gems and precious stones, he describes the properties of the fossil resin, amber. The ability of amber to attract dust was recognised and in fact the word electricity is derived from elektron, the Greek for amber. 

A siinilar observation had been made (with less dramatic consequences) nearly 2000 y earlier by Pliny the Elder when he wrote Beryls, it is thought, are of the same nature as the smaragdus (emerald), or at leasi closely analogous (Historia Nuturalis, Book 37). 

G. Pliny (the Elder), ad 23-79, mentions sulfur in several of the many books of his posthumously published major work, Naturalis Historia. 

Parejko K. Pliny the Elder s Silphium First Recorded Species Extinction. Conservation Biol 2003 17 925-7. 

The appreciation of color and the use of colorants dates back to antiquity. The art of making colored candy is shown in paintings in Egyptian tombs as far back as 1500 bc. Pliny the Elder described the use of artificial colorants in wine in 1500 bc. Spices and condiments were colored at least 500 years ago. The use of colorants in cosmetics is better documented than colorants in foods. Archaeologists have pointed out that Egyptian women used green copper ores as eye shadow as early as 5000 bc. Henna was used to redden hair and feet, carmine to redden lips, faces were colored yellow with saffron and kohl, an arsenic compound, was used to darken eyebrows. More recently, in Britain, in the twelfth century, sugar was colored red with kermes and madder and purple with Tyrian purple. 

Government concern about the adulteration and misbranding of pharmaceutical products extends back to ancient times.Pliny the Elder, for example, in the first century ad, criticised the fashionable druggists shops which spoil everything with fraudulent adulterations. As a result, various forms of government control to prevent the adulteration and misbranding of... 

Although the phenomenon of allelopathy was first described by De Candolle (1), Pliny the Elder writing in the first century A.D. in his Naturalis Historia described the failure of certain plants to grow in the shade of Juglans regia. In addition nearly every society has had folklore about the effects of one plant upon another. 

Early evidence of black walnut allelopathy. As early as 77 A.D., the Juglans genus was cited as having a poisonous effect on other plants. An even earlier account was recorded by Pliny the Elder in... 

Although the ancient conception of an element was quite different from the modem one, a few of the substances now recognized as chemical elements have been known and used since the dawn of history. Although no one knows who discovered these ancient building-stones of the universe, the writings of Pliny the Elder and Dioscorides and the Hebrew and Hindu Scriptures abound in interesting allusions to the metals, gold, silver, copper, iron, lead, tin, and mercury, and the non-metals, sulfur and carbon. 

Pliny the Elder (A.D. 23-79) said that grains of gold were found in the stream-beds of the Tagus in Spain, the Po in Italy, the Hebrus in Thracia, the Pactolus in Asia Minor, and the Ganges in India (5). In the second century before Christ, a cupellation process was used for refining the metal, and in Pliny s time the mercury process was well known (6). 

Pliny the Elder, 23-79 A.D. Roman philosopher. Author of a Natural History in 37 books, in which he discussed the astronomy, geology, zoology, botany, agriculture, mineralogy, and medicine of his time. 

Since cassiterite is the only important ore of tin, it must have been the earliest source of the metal. Although the Cassiterides, or tin islands, vaguely mentioned by classical writers were usually supposed to have been named for the ore, cassiterite may possibly have been named for the islands, just as copper may have been named for Cyprus and bronze for Brundisium (Brindisi, Italy) (62). Some scholars identify the Cassiterides with the Scilly Isles. In speaking of mirrors, Pliny the Elder stated that the best known to our forefathers were made at Brundisium from a mixture of copper and stagnum (63). 

Pliny the Elder, Natural History, translated by Bostock and Riley, Geo. 

The so-called arsenic of the Greeks and Romans consisted of the poisonous sulfides, orpiment and sandarac, mined with heavy loss of life by slave labor (2). Both Pliny the Elder and Dioscorides were familiar with orpiment and realgar (sandarac) (70). The latter mentioned that Arsenicum and Sandaracha occur in the same mines, that sandarac has a brimstone-like odor, and that these two ores are roasted in the same manner (71). 

The Romans manufactured a copper-zinc alloy which they called orichalcum or aurichalcum. In speaking of copper, Pliny the Elder... 

Although Pliny the Elder s description of a heavy white substance... 

Edward Arnold, London, 1932, p. 139 Pliny the Elder, Historia Natur-alis, Book 36, chaps. 23—4,... 

Je ryl was probably not used in Egypt before Ptolemaic times (87). A. Lucas stated that the mines in the Red Sea hills, which were mentioned by Strabo and Pliny the Elder, were probably the only source of beryl in ancient times (87). In 1817 F. Cailliaud discovered the emerald mines near Mt. Zabara nearly in the same state in which they had been left by the engineers of the Ptolemies. He penetrated into a vast number of excavations and subterraneous canals, some of which are so deep that four hundred men may work in them at once.. .. M. C. himself set about working the mines, and he has presented six pounds of emeralds to Mahommed Ali Pashaw (88). 

Cheyne, T K. and J S. Black, Encyclopaedia Biblica, Vol 1, The Macmillan Company, New York, 1899, columns 545-6 Pliny the Elder, Historia Naturalis, Book 37, chaps. 16-20. 

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