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Batrachites, Toadstone

Basanites, Basalt Page of 384 Batrachites, Toadstone Text size:minus plus Restore normal size   Mail page  Print this page
BATRACHITES.
43
BATRACHITES : Toad-stone.
The brief notice of this stone by Pliny contains no more than, " Coptos also produces the Batrachites, one sort like a frog in colour, another ebony, the third of red mixed with black." Small figures of frogs (done in the later Egyptian (style,) perforated to be worn as amulets, occasionally are to be met with cut in full relief out of a yellow and green Jasper, reproducing with singular exactness the actual appearance of the reptile, and which, therefore, has some claim to bo pronounced the ancient Batrachites. No further e of this stone can be traced in the other writers of antiquity.
But this singular epithet, primarily intended only to denote the peculiar colour of the stone, furnished later timeä with the foundation for a most marvellous fable, which long obtained, as the number of examples still preserved attest, universal credit throughout Europe. Understanding the ancient term as implying the natural production of the animal according to the analogy of other similar names, as the Saurites, Echites, &c, doctors taught that the " toad, ugly and venomous, wears yet a precious jewel in his head." A full account of this will be found in that repertory of mediaeval medical lore, the ' Speculum Lapi-dum ' of Camillo, who, as physician to Borgia, ought to know something about poisons. He describes it by the names of Borax, Nosa, and Crapondinus, and as being found in the brain of a newly-killed toad. There are two kinds, the
Basanites, Basalt Page of 384 Batrachites, Toadstone
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