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202 THE MAGIC OF JEWELS AND CHARMS
something rare and of great value and the stone must have been highly prized when such a price was paid for it." 2
The
first mention of the bezoar stone is by the Arabic and Persian writers.
In the Arabic work attributed to Aristotle, and which was certainly
written as early as the ninth and possibly in the seventh century, it
is even described
among
the precious stones. The same is true of the oldest Persian work on
medicine, namely, that of Abu Mansur Muwaffak, composed about the
middle of the tenth century. A valuable monograph on the bezoar was
written in 1625 by Caspar Bauhin, a learned professor and physician of
Basel; this work contains all that was then known of the various
qualities ascribed to this substance by the older authors.
The
bezoar does not appear to have been used medicinally in Europe before
the twelfth century, when the so-called pestilential fevers became very
prevalent. In their distress people turned to the lapis bezoar, which
was so highly recommended by the Arabic physicians whose works were,
at that time, becoming more widely known through the intercourse
between the Spaniards and the Moors. Caspar Bauhin writes :3
" Even to-day princes and nobles prize it very highly and guard it in
their treasures among their most precious gems ; so that the physicians
are forced, sometimes
»Ibid., pp. 104-5.
* Caspari Bauhini, " De lapidi» bezaaris ortu natura," etc., Basile», 1625, t>. 3.
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