Bezoars stone

Bezoar

So called because it is found in the stomach of the sort of goat

named bezoar. This is originally a Persian word,

viz. badzcher, or lazcher, or phahazar, which signifies an antidote.

Avenzoar is the first who mentions it as a medicine, or who gives

its history.

Bezoar stones are preternatural or morbid concretions formed in the

bodies of many animals; they arc-composed of several strata, or

layers, like an onion. In the Hist. de lacad. an. 1703, it is

asserted, that all bezoar stones are bilious concretions of the

respective animals which afford them.

Bezoars may be divided into: 1. The true oriental and occidental.

2. Animal concretions which resemble bezoar; as those from apes,

and even the various species of pearls and crabs' eyes.

3. The several species of fossil bezoars. 4. Those which have only

the shape, without the virtues of bezoar, as the calculi in the

human bladder, kidneys, and gall bladder; or in the same parts of

oxen. 5. The aegragropila, balls of matted hair, and bezoar Germanicum,

see Capra Al-pina.

Bezoar orientalis, called also lapis bezoar, hircus bezoarticus,

and the oriental bezoar stone, from the East Indies. It is supposed

to be produced in the cavity at the bottom of the fourth stomach of

a species of goat in Persia called parau. Antelope gazella Lin.

though not peculiar to this species, as it occurs also in the

antilope cervicapra and the capra aegagrus Lin. It is only found

in the old ones, and exclusively in those which feed on particular

mountains.

This stone, finely powdered and levigated with spirit of wine,

was formerly made into balls, which were called Gascoigne balls,

from Gascoign their inventor. What are at present sold under that

name by the trading chemists, if any remain, are a sophisticated

medicine without bezoar.

Bezoar occidentalis, called also lapis bezoar, Pe-ruvianus, the

American or occidental bezoar, from the West Indies.

It is found in the stomach of an animal of the slag kind, called

animate bezoarticum occidentale, a native of Peru, and other parts

in the Spanish West Indies; and in the stomach of the yzard of the

Alps, antilope rupi-caftra and capra ibex Lin.

Bezoar hystricis, (from the hedge hog, because its spots resemble

the bristles of an hedge hog,) pila hystricis, bezoar porci, lapis

porcinus, petro del porco, lapis Malacensis, the porcupine bezoar,

or gall stone. It is found in the gall bladder of an Indian porcupine,

particularly in the province of Malacca, of a roundish figure, and of

a pale or purplish colour, or between a green and white; it is soft,

smooth, and slippery to the touch; to the taste intensely bitter, and

the water in which it is steeped soon becomes bitter also. It does

not appear to differ from the biliary concretions of an ox or any

other animal. It is carried in the pocket as an amulet, and hired

in Portugal at about a shilling a day.

Bezoar simiae, or Lapis simiae, the bezoar of the monkey. Stones

of this kind are found in the stomach of certain monkeys in Brasil

and the East Indies, though they rarely produce them.. They are

about the size of hazel nuts, harder than the oriental bezoar,

of a dark green colour, almost black. The scarcity-renders them

costly, and they are seldom to be met with. Bezoars are also

taken from the stomachs of I i 2 crocodiles, dogs, mules, and the

camelus vicugna Lin. All the true bezoars, when rubbed, exhale

a perfume; and, when cut through, are found to contain a nucleus

of vegetable matter, successively covered by laminae of an ammoniacal

magnesian phosphat, mixed with a coloured extractive vegetable matter,

and animal fluids of a bilious kind. These give the green colour and

the smell of musk. On the molares of ruminant animals there is a brown

golden coloured coat, like that on the surface of their bezoars.

Fourcroy has analysed the oriental bezoars with some care,

(Annales du Museum dhistoire' Naturelle, vol. i. p. 111).

He considers them as an animal resin different from every concretion.

They are softened by heat, easily penetrated by a hot needle, exhaling

an aromatic and musky odour; they burn and inflame with a thick smoke,

impart a colour to boiling water, and wholly dissolve in alcohol, which

they colour. They are dissolved by caustic alkalis, differing in this

from vegetable resins.

The false bezoars are prepared with powdered oyster shells made into

small balls with gum water, and perfumed with ambergris. They effervesce

with acids, and, when cut, have no concentric laminae; nor, when broken,

any crystalline striae; nor, when rubbed on paper previously covered with

chalk, do they leave an olive coloured mark. The Goa and Malacca stones

are of this kind.

Bezoar fossile. Fossile bezoar is a small hollow body from Italy, found

in sand and clay pits, of a purple colour, with a rough surface, the size

of a walnut, and light. When broke, it is found to consist of an irony

crust, containing in its hollow a fine greenish white earth resembling

pale bezoar. The earth is used, and not the shells. It seems to be of

the nature of bole armoniac, or rather calcareous; and is also called

bezoar minerale, terra sicula et noceriana, lapis bezahan, sicu-lus albus,

belzuar minor. Siciliana, mineral bezoar, and Sicilian earth.

Notwithstanding all the boasted virtues of these bezoars, viz. the power of

destroying poisons and reanimating the vital powers, it is certain that

they are absolutely indigestible in the stomachs of the animals in which

they are found; and they are equally so in the human, except when

accompanied with an acid; so that no more can be expected from them

than from any of the testacea that are soluble in acids; but they are

inferior to them, as far less absorbent, and more difficultly acted on

by any acid.

Bezoar microcosmicum, called also calculus huma-nus, the calculus of

the human bladder.

It is various in its degrees of hardness, as well as in its size and figure.

It has been used in the place of the more costly sorts.

Bezoar animale. Animal bezoar. Take the whitest calcined hartshorn

levigated to the greatest subtility, pour on it, drop by drop, the spirit

of vitriol, to form it into a paste to be made into balls.

A powder of liver and heart of vipers is called ani-inal bezoar.

Bezoar bovinus, called also alcheron lapis. The Portuguese call it mesang

de vaca. It is a stone found in the gall bladder of a bull.

Bezoar mineral. See Bezoar fossils.