Pythagoras taught that holding dill in the left hand would prevent
epilepsy. Serapion of Alexandria (B.C. 278) prescribed for
epilepsy the warty excrescences on the forelegs of animals, camel’s
brain and gall, rennet of seal, dung of crocodile, blood of turtle,
and other animal products. Pliny alludes to a tradition, that a root
of autumnal nettle would cure a tertian fever, provided that when
it is dug the patient’s name and his parent’s names are pronounced
aloud; that the longest tooth of a black dog worn as an amulet would
cure quartan fever; that the snout and tips of the ears of a mouse,
the animal itself to run free, wrapped in a rose coloured patch, also
worn as an amulet, would similarly cure the same disease; the right
eye of a living lizard wrapped in a piece of goat’s skin; and a herb
picked from the head of a statue and tied up with red thread, are other
specimens of the amulets popular in his time. But Pliny appears to
doubt if all these treatments can be trusted. He mentions one, that is
that the heart of a hen placed on a woman’s left breast while she is
asleep will make her tell all her secrets, and this he characterizes as
a portentous lie. Mr. Cockayne quoting this, remarks dryly, “Perhaps
he had tried it.” Alexander of Tralles recommends a number of amulets,
some of which he mentions he has proved. Thus for colic he names the
dung of a wolf with some bits of bone in it in a closed tube worn on
the right arm or thigh; an octagonal iron ring on which are engraved
the words “Flee, flee, ho, ho, Bile, the lark was searching” good
for bilious disorders; for gout, gather henbane when the moon is in
Aquarius or Pisces before sunset with the thumb and third finger of the
left hand, saying at the time an invocation inviting the holy herb to
come to the house of blank and cure M. or N.; with a lot more.
The Greeks named the Furies Eumenides, good people, evidently with the
idea of propitiating them. For a similar reason fairies were known as
good folk by our ancestors.