The Emplastrum Vigonium was a highly complicated compound, which was
held in great veneration and is the subject of innumerable comments
in the pharmaceutical writings of the sixteenth, seventeenth, and
eighteenth centuries. Charas, Lemery, Baumé, and others modified and
simplified it. John de Vigo was a native of Naples, where he was born
about 1460, and he became the first physician of Pope Julius II. His
plaster still figures in the French Codex, and contains 600 parts of
mercury by weight in 3,550 parts. This made into a liquid with olive
oil and spread on calico makes the sparadrap of Vigo, in which form it
is most frequently used, as an application to syphilitic eruptions.
Ambrose Paré gives the earliest formula for Vigo’s plaster, which was
then called Emplastrum Vigonium seu de Ranis. It was looked upon as a
masterpiece of combination. First 3½ oz. of earthworms were washed in
water, and afterwards in wine. Then they and twenty-six live frogs were
macerated in 2 lb. of odoriferous wine, and the whole was boiled down
to two-thirds of its volume. A decoction of camel’s hay (andropogon
schœnanthus), French lavender, and matricaria (chamomilla) was then
mixed with this wine. Meanwhile 1 lb. of golden litharge had been
“nourished” for twelve hours with oils of chamomile, dill, lilies, and
saffron; these were melted down with 1 lb. each of the fat of the pig,
calf, and viper. Human fat might be used instead of that of vipers.
Juices of elder root and of elecampane with euphorbium, frankincense,
and oil of spike were then worked in and the whole melted with white
wax. Lastly, quicksilver extinguished by turpentine, styrax, oil of
bitter almonds, and oil of bay, were added. In Lemery’s time the
minimum proportion of mercury was 1 drachm to 1 oz. of the plaster.
There was also a simple Vigo’s plaster made without mercury. In the
Codex formula the worms, the frogs, the fats, the herbs, roots, and
oils have all gone, but some more aromatic resins are added.