The first formula for mercurial pills was one which Barbarossa II, a
famous pirate and king of Algiers, and admiral of the Turkish Fleet
under Soliman, Sultan of Turkey, sent to Francis I, king of France,
some time in the second quarter of the sixteenth century. The recipe
was published (says Dr. Etienne Michelon, of Tours, in his “Histoire
Pharmacotechnique de Mercure”) in 1537 by Petrus de Bayro, physician
to the Duke of Savoy. He does not give the exact formula, but Lemery
quotes it as follows:--
“Best aloes, and quicksilver extinguished by rose juice, aa 6 drachms;
“Trochises of agaric, ½ oz.; selected rhubarb, 2 drachms;
“Canella, myrrh, mastic, aa 1 drachm; musk, amber, aa 1 scruple;
“Make a mass with Venice turpentine.”
Lemery says you cannot kill the mercury with rose juice, but must use
some of the Venice turpentine.
These pills were largely used in syphilis, but they were practically
superseded later by the pills of Belloste, which are still official in
the French Codex. These were very similar. Belloste was a French Army
surgeon, and his formula was devised about the year 1700. A formula for
them was published in the Pharmacopœia of Renaudot during Belloste’s
lifetime, but after the death of Belloste in 1730 his son tried to
make a mystery of the pills and sold them as a proprietary product,
which probably had the effect of making them popular. The formula of
Renaudot, which is also that of the Codex, was: Mercury, 24 (killed
with honey); aloes, 24; rhubarb, 12; scammony, 8; black pepper, 4. Made
into pills, each of which should contain 5 centigrams of mercury.