The sumbul : a new Asiatic remedy of great power against nervous disorders, spasms of the stomach, cramp, hysterical affections, paralysis of the limbs, and epilepsy : with an account of its physical, chemical, and medicinal characters, and specific property of checking the progress of collapse-cholera, as first ascertained in Russia / by A.B. Granville.

  • Granville, A. B. (Augustus Bozzi), 1783-1872.
Date:
1859
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The sumbul : a new Asiatic remedy of great power against nervous disorders, spasms of the stomach, cramp, hysterical affections, paralysis of the limbs, and epilepsy : with an account of its physical, chemical, and medicinal characters, and specific property of checking the progress of collapse-cholera, as first ascertained in Russia / by A.B. Granville. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    13/52 (page 13)
    obtained from tlience, Mr. Savory applied in that quarter for, and was able to obtain, a sufficient quan- tity of the drug, for which I am informed he was made to pay a high price. But no information con- cerning the substance itself could he get along with it, except that it was used in perfumery. He next endeavoured, therefore, to procure what knowledge he could by inquiries among the botanists and scien- tific medical men in London—one of whom, in par- ticular, well known for his industry and persevering researches among books, had offered to lay a wager he would succeed in obtaining the desired informa- tion. But neither through this gentleman nor through any other channel has Mr. Savory been able to attain his object. Mr. Savory has, nevertheless, worked upon the materials he had procured from Hamburgh and what- ever information I had originally given him in Sep- tember last, when I first exhibited the substance to him. He has produced one or two preparations from the drug, one of which, a tincture in proof spirits, he afterwards propounded to one of the medical officers of King’s College Hospital as a likely remedy to be of use in Epilepsy, a suggestion he derived from the drug bearing in one of its physical characters some analogy to musk, as will be seen by a reference to the second number of the Lancet for January, 1850.* * The late eminent botanist, Robert Brown, informed me afterwards that he had specimens of the Sumbul given him by Dr. Richter, at Moscow, in 1832, which he brought to England, and that the same gentleman had sent him some more specimens, still in his possession, but unaccompanied