_Gummi-resina Myrrha_; _Myrrh_; F. _Myrrhe_; G. _Myrrhe_.
=Botanical Origin=—Ehrenberg who visited Egypt, Nubia, Abyssinia, and
Arabia in the years 1820-26, brought home with him specimens of the
myrrh trees found at Ghizan (Gison or Dhizân), a town on the strip of
coast-region called Tihâma, opposite the islands of Farsan Kebir and
Farsan Seghir, and a little to the north of Lohaia, on the eastern
side of the Red Sea, in latitude 16° 40′, and also on the neighbouring
mountains of Djara (or Shahra) and Kara. Here the myrrh trees form
the underwood of the forests of _Acacia_, _Moringa_, and _Euphorbia_.
Nees von Esenbeck who examined these specimens, drew up from them a
description of what he called _Balsamodendron Myrrha_, which he figured
in 1828.[548]
After Ehrenberg’s herbarium had been incorporated in the Royal
Herbarium of Berlin, Berg examined these specimens, and came to
the conclusion that they consist of _two species_, namely that
described and figured by Nees, and a second to which was attached
(_correctly_ we must hope) two memoranda bearing the following
words:—“_Ipsa Myrrhæ arbor ad Gison,—Martio_,” and “_Ex huic simillima
arbore ad Gison ipse Myrrham effluentem legi_.[549] _Hæc specimina
lecta sunt in montibus Djara et Kara Februario._” This plant Berg
named _B. Ehrenbergianum_.[550] Oliver in his _Flora of Tropical
Africa_ (1868)[551] is disposed to consider Berg’s plant the same
as _B. Opobalsamun_ Kth., a tree or shrub yielding myrrh, found by
Schweinfurth on the Bisharrin mountains in Abyssinia, not far from the
coast between Suakin and Edineb. But Schweinfurth himself does not
admit the identity of the two plants.[552] It is certain, however, that
the myrrh of commerce is chiefly of African origin.
Captain F. M. Hunter, Assistant Resident of Aden, informed us[553]
that the Arabian myrrh tree, the _Didthin_, is found not only in the
southern provinces of Arabia, Yemen, and Hadramant, probably also in
the southern part of Oman, but likewise on the range of hills which,
on the African shore, runs parallel to the Somali coast. The Somalis
who gather the myrrh in Arabia allege that the Arabian “Didthin”
is identical with that of their own district. Its exudation is the
true myrrh, “_Mulmul_” of the Somalis, the “_Mur_” of the Arabs, or
“_Heerabole_”[554] of the Indians.
[548] _Plantæ Medicinales_, Düsseldorf, ii. (1828) tab. 355.
[549] On applying in 1872 to Prof. Ehrenberg to know if it were
possible that we could _see_ this very specimen, we received the answer
that it could not be found.
[550] Berg u. Schmidt, _Darstellung u. Beschreibung ... offizin.
Gewächse_, iv. (1863) tab. xxix. d.; also _Bot. Zeitung_, 16 Mai, 1862.
155.
[551] Vol. i. 326.
[552] Petermann, _Geogr. Mittheilungen_, 1868. 127.
[553] Letters addressed in 1877 to F. A. F..
[554] _Bola_, _Bal_, or _Bol_ were names of the myrrh in the Egyptian
antiquity.—Ehrenberg, _De Myrrhæ et Opocalpasi ... detectis plantis_,
Berolini, 1841, fol.
Another myrrh tree, according to Captain Hunter, is growing in Ogadain
and the districts round Harrar, that is between the 7th and 10th
parallels, N. lat., and 43° to 50° E. long. This is the “_Habaghadi_”
of the Somalis, which is not found in Arabia, nor in the coast range
of the Somali country, but only at a considerable distance from the
sea-shore. Its exudation is the coarse myrrh, habaghadi of the Somalis
and Arabs and “_Baisabole_” of the Indians.
Hildebrandt has collected the didthin, or didin as he writes, in the
coast range alluded to, that is in the Ahl or Serrut Mountains, where
the tree is growing on sunny slopes in elevations of 500 to 1,500
metres. He has ascertained that it is identical with Ehrenberg’s tree,
_Balsamodendron Myrrha_ Nees. It is a low tree of crippled appearance,
attaining not more than 3 metres. This species must therefore be
pointed out as the source of true myrrh of the European commerce.
=History=—(See also further on, Bissabol). Myrrh has been used from the
earliest times together with olibanum as a constituent of incense,[555]
perfumes, and unguents. It was an ingredient of the holy oil used in
the Jewish ceremonial as laid down by Moses: and it was also one of
the numerous components of the celebrated _Kyphi_ of the Egyptians,
a preparation used in fumigations, medicine, and the process of
embalming, and of which there were several varieties.
In the previous article we have pointed out (p. 137) several early
references to myrrh in connection with olibanum, in which it is
observable that the myrrh (when weights are mentioned) is always in
the smaller quantity. Of the use of the drug in mediæval Europe there
are few notices, but they tend to show that the commodity was rare and
precious. This myrrh is recommended in the Anglo-Saxon Leech-books[556]
to be used with frankincense in the superstitious medical practice
of the 11th century. In a manuscript of the Monastery of Rheinau,
near Schaffhausen, Switzerland, we also find that, apparently in the
11th century, myrrh as well as olibanum were used in ordeals in the
“judicium aquæ bullientis.”[557] The drug was also used by the Welsh
“Physicians of Myddfai” in the 13th century. In the Wardrobe accounts
of Edward I. there is an entry under date 6th January, 1299, for
gold, frankincense, and _myrrh_, offered by the king in his chapel on
that day, it being the Feast of Epiphany.[558] Myrrh again figures
in the accounts of Geoffroi de Fleuri,[559] master of the wardrobe
(_argentier_) to Philippe le Long, king of France, where record is
made of the purchase of—“4 onces d’estorat calmite” (see Styrax) “et
_mierre_ (myrrh) ... encenz et laudanon,” (Ladanum, the resin of Cistus
creticus L.)—for the funeral of John, posthumous son of Louis X., A.D.
1316.
Gold, silver, silk, precious stones, pearls, camphor, musk, _myrrh_,
and spices are enumerated[560] as the presents which the Khan of Cathay
sent to Pope Benedict XII. at Avignon about the year 1342. The myrrh
destined for this circuitous route to Europe[561] was doubtless that
of the Arabian traders, with whom the Chinese had constant intercourse
during the middle ages. Myrrh in fact is still somewhat largely
consumed in China.[562]
[555] Cantic. i 13, iii. 6; Genes. xliii. 11; Exod. ii. 12, 30, xxiii.
34-36; John xix. 39; Mark xv. 23; Proverbs vii. 17.
[556] Cockayne, _Leechdoms &c. of Early England_, ii. (1865) 295, 297.
[557] Range, _Adjurationen, Exorcismen, Benedictionen, &c., in
Mittheilungen der antiquar. Gesellschaft in Zürich_, xii. (1859) 187.
[558] _Liber quotidianus Contrarotulatoris Garderobæ.... Edwardi I._,
Lond. 1787. pp. xxxii. and 27.—The custom is still observed by the
sovereigns of England, and the Queen’s oblation of gold, frankincense,
and myrrh is still annually presented on the Feast of Epiphany in the
Chapel Royal in London.
[559] Doüet d’Arcq, _Comptes de l’Argenterie des rois de France_, 1851.
19.
[560] Yule, _Cathay and the way thither_, ii. 357.
[561] For the costly presents in question _never reached their
destination_, having been all plundered by the way!
[562] Shanghai imported in 1872, 18,600 lbs. of myrrh.—_Reports of
Trade at the Treaty Ports in China for_ 1872, p. 4.
The name _Myrrh_ is from the Hebrew and Arabic _Mur_, meaning bitter,
whence also the Greek σμύρνα. The ancient Egyptian _Bola_ or _Bal_,
and the Sanskrit _Vola_ are preserved in the Persian and Indian words
_Bol_, _Bola_, and _Heerabol_, well-known names for myrrh.
_Stacte_ (στακτὴ), a substance often mentioned by the ancients, is said
by Pliny to be a spontaneous liquid exudation of the myrrh tree, more
valuable than myrrh itself. The author of the Periplus of the Erythrean
Sea represents it as exported from Muza in Arabia[563] together with
myrrh. Theophrastus[564] speaks of myrrh as of two kinds, solid and
liquid. No drug of modern times has been identified with the _stacte_
or _liquid myrrh_ of the ancients: that it was a substance obtainable
in quantity seems evident from the fact that 150 pounds of it, said to
be the offering of an Egyptian city, were presented to St. Silvester at
Rome, A.D. 314-335.[565]
The myrrh of the ancients was not always obtained from Arabia. The
author of the Periplus,[566] who wrote about A.D. 64, records it to
have been an export of Abalites, Malao, and Mosyllon (the last named
the modern Berbera), ancient ports of the African coast outside the
straits of Bab-el-Mandeb; and he even mentions that it is conveyed by
small vessels to the opposite shores of Arabia.
=Secretion=—Marchand[567] who examined and figured the sections of a
branch of three years’ growth of _B. Myrrha_, represents the gum-resin
as chiefly deposited in the cortical layers, with a little in the
medulla.
=Collection=—By the Somal tribe myrrh is largely collected as it flows
out, incisions, according to Hildebrandt, being never practised.
From the information given by Ehrenberg to Nees von Esenbeck,[568]
it appears that myrrh when it first exudes is of an oily and then of
a buttery appearance, yellowish white, gradually assuming a golden
tint and becoming reddish as it hardens. It exudes from the bark
like cherry-tree gum, and becomes dark and of inferior value by age.
Although Ehrenberg says that the myrrh he saw was of fine quality, he
does not mention it being gathered by the natives.
With regard to the localities[569] in which the drug is collected,
Cruttenden,[570] who visited the Somali coast in 1843, says that myrrh
is brought from the Wadi Nogâl, south west of Cape Gardafui, and from
Murreyhan, Ogadain and Agahora; and that some few trees are found on
the mountains behind Bunder Murayah. Major Harris[571] saw the myrrh
tree in the Adel desert and in the jungle of the Háwash, on the way
from Tajura to Shoa.
[563] Vincent, _Commerce of the Ancients_, ii. (1870) 316.—Muza or
Moosa is supposed to be identical with a place still bearing that name
lying about 20 miles east of Mokha.
[564] Lib. ix. c. 4.
[565] Vignolius, _Liber Pontificalis_, i. (1724) 95.
[566] Vincent, _op. cit._ ii. 127. 129. 135.
[567] _Recherches sur l’Organisation des Burseracées_, Paris, 1868, p.
42, pl. i.
[568] _Op. cit._ at p. 140, note 1.
[569] See paper with map in _Ocean Highways_, April, 1873, also _Pharm.
Journ._ 19 April, 1873. 821, and Hanbury’s _Science Papers_, 378.
[570] _Trans. Bombay Geogr. Soc._ vii. (1846) 123.
[571] _Highlands of Æthiopia_ (1844) i. 426; ii. 414.
Vaughan[572] states that the Somali Country and the neighbourhood of
Hurrur (or Harar or Adari, 9° 20′ N., 42° 17′ E.) south west of Zeila
are the chief producing districts. It is generally brought to the great
fair of Berbera held in November, December, and January, where it is
purchased by the Banians of India, and shipped for Bombay.
It appears that all these informations rather refer to the Bisabol or
Habaghadi variety of myrrh; only the first notice, due to Hildebrandt,
applies to true myrrh.
Myrrh trees abound on the hills about Shugra and Sureea in the
territory of the Fadhli or Fudthli tribe, lying to the eastward of
Aden; myrrh is collected from them by Somalis who cross from the
opposite coast for the purpose and pay a tribute for the privilege to
the Arabs, who appear to be scarcely acquainted with this drug.[573]
But a sample of it, received by one of us from Vaughan in 1852, and
others we have since seen in London (and easily, recognized), proved
it to be somewhat different from typical myrrh, and it is probably
afforded by another species than Balsamodendron Myrrha.
It would thus appear that there are three different trees affording
myrrh, namely that just alluded to, secondly the “Habaghadi,” and
thirdly that growing east of Aden.
=Description=—Myrrh consists of irregular roundish masses, varying
in size from small grains up to pieces as large as an egg, and
occasionally much larger. They are of an opaque reddish-brown with
dusty dull surface. When broken, they exhibit a rough or waxy fracture,
having a moist and unctuous appearance, especially when pressed, and
a rich brown hue. The fractured, translucent surface often displays
characteristic whitish marks which the ancients compared to the
light mark at the base of the finger-nails. Myrrh has a peculiar and
agreeable fragrance with an aromatic, bitter, and acrid taste. It
cannot be finely powdered until deprived by drying of some of its
essential oil and water; nor when heated does it melt like colophony.
Water disintegrates myrrh, forming a light brown emulsion, which viewed
under the microscope appears made up of colourless drops, among which
are granules of yellow resin. Alcohol dissolves the resin of myrrh,
leaving angular non-crystalline particles of gum[574] and fragments of
bark.
=Chemical Composition=—Myrrh is a mixture, in very varying proportions,
of resin, mucilaginous matters, and essential oil. A fine specimen of
myrrh from the Somali coast, with which Captain Hunter, in 1877, kindly
presented one of us, yielded 27 per cent. of resin. The undissolved
portion is partly soluble in water.
[572] _Pharm. Journ._ xii. (1853) 226.
[573] Capt. S. B. Miles, in _Journ. of R. Geograph._ Soc. xli. (1871)
236. The country visited by Miles and Munzinger is the “Smyrnifera
regio exterior,” the outer country producing myrrh of the ancients,
about 14° 10′ N. lat. and 57° E. long. See also Sprenger, _Alte
Geographie Arabiens_, 313.
[574] Druggists who prepare large quantities of Tincture of Myrrh may
utilize this gum for making a common sort of mucilage.—_Pharm. Journ._
10 June, 1871, 1001.
The resin dissolves completely in chloroform or alcohol, and the
colour of the latter solution is but slightly darkened by perchloride
of iron. It is but partially soluble in alkalis or in bisulphide of
carbon. Brückner (1867) found this portion to yield 75·6 per cent. of
carbon and 9·5 of hydrogen. The resin which the bisulphide refuses to
dissolve, is freely soluble in ether. It contains only 57·4 per cent.
of carbon. The resin of myrrh to which, when moistened with alcohol, a
small quantity of concentrated nitric or hydrochloric acid is added,
assumes a violet hue, but far less brilliant than that displayed
by resin of galbanum when treated in a similar manner. But a most
intensely violet liquid may be obtained by adding bromine to the resin
dissolved in bisulphide of carbon. If the resin of myrrh as afforded
by alcohol is warmed with petroleum (boiling at 70° C.), only a small
amount of resin is dissolved. This liquid becomes turbid if vapours of
bromine are added; a violet flocculent matter deposits, whereas the
just above-mentioned solution in the bisulphide continues clear on
addition of bromine.
The resin of myrrh is not capable of affording umbelliferone like that
of galbanum. By melting it with potash, pyrocatechin and protocatechuic
acid are produced in small amount.
Myrrh yields on distillation a volatile oil which in operating on 25
lb. of the drug, we obtained to the extent of ¾ per cent.[575] It is a
yellowish, rather viscid liquid, neutral to litmus, having a powerful
odour of myrrh and sp. gr. 0·988 at 13° C.[576] In a column 50 mm.
long, it deviates a ray of light 30·1° to the left. By submitting it
to distillation, we obtained before the oil boiled, a few drops of
a strongly acid liquid having the smell of formic acid. Neutralized
with ammonia, this liquid produced in solution of mercurous nitrate a
whitish precipitate which speedily darkened, thus indicating formic
acid, which is developed in the oil. Old myrrh is in fact said to
yield an acid distillate. The oil begins to boil at about 266° C., and
chiefly distills over between 270° and 290°.
On combustion in the usual way it afforded carbon 84·70, hydrogen 9·98.
Having been again rectified in a current of dry carbonic acid, it had
a boiling point of 262-263° C., and now afforded[577] carbon 84·70,
hydrogen 10·26, which would nearly answer to the formula C₂₂H₃₂O. The
results of Ruickholdt’s analysis (1845) of essential oil of myrrh
assign it the formula C₁₀H₁₄O, which is widely different from that
indicated by our experiments.
The oil which we rectified displays a faintly greenish hue; it is
miscible in every proportion with bisulphide of carbon, the solution
exhibiting at first no peculiar coloration when a drop of nitric or
sulphuric acid is added. Yet the mixture to which nitric acid (1·20)
has been added, assumes after an hour or two a fine violet hue which
is very persistent, enduring even if the liquid is allowed to dry up
in a large capsule. If to the crude oil dissolved in bisulphide of
carbon bromine be added, a violet hue is produced; and if the solution
is allowed to evaporate, and the residue diluted with spirit of wine,
it assumes a fine blue which disappears on addition of an alkali. The
oil is not much altered by boiling with alcoholic potash, nor does it
combine with alkaline bisulphites.
[575] Ruickholdt got 2·18 per cent.; Bley and Diesel (1845) from 1·6 to
3·4 per cent. of an acid oil. We are kindly informed by Mr. Fritzsche
of Leipzig (Messrs. Schimmel & Co.) that good myrrh distilled on a
large scale yields as much as 4·4 per cent. of oil. (Letter dated 13th
June, 1878.)
[576] Gladstone (1863) found the oil a little _heavier_ than water.
[577] Analyses performed in my laboratory by Dr. Buri, February,
1874. See also my paper on Carvol, _Pharm. Journ._ vii. (1876) 75, or
_Yearbook of Pharmacy_ (1877) 51—F. A. F.
The _Bitter principle_ of myrrh is contained in the resin as extracted
by alcohol. By exhausting the resin with warm water an acid brown
solution is obtained, from which a dark, viscid, neutral mass separates
if the liquid is concentrated; it is contaminated with a large amount
of inorganic matter, from which it may be purified by means of ether.
Yet the latter affords also but an amorphous, somewhat brittle brown
substance, softening at 80°-90° C. This bitter principle reminds us
of that mentioned in our article Elemi, page 151; it is but sparingly
soluble in water; the yellowish solution is intensely bitter. The
bitter principle of myrrh appears to be a glucoside. We have not
succeeded in preparing it in a more satisfactory state.
=Commerce=—Myrrh is chiefly shipped by way of Berbera to Aden, and
thence either to Europe or to Bombay. The exports of Aden in the fiscal
year 1875 to 1876 were 1439 cwt.; one-half of which went to Bombay, one
third to the United Kingdom.[578]
The bags or bales which contain the myrrh are opened in Bombay, and the
drug is sorted. The better portion goes to Europe, the refuse to China,
where it is probably used as an incense.[579]
=Uses=—Myrrh, though much used, does not appear to possess any very
important medicinal powers, and is chiefly employed on account of its
bitter, aromatic properties.
=Other Varieties of Myrrh=—Though the myrrh of commerce exhibits some
diversity of appearance, the drug-brokers and druggists of London are
not in the habit of applying any special designations to the different
qualities. There are however two varieties which deserve notice.
1. _Bissa Bol_ (_Bhesabol_, _Bysabole_), _Habaghadi_ or _Hebbakhade_ of
the Somalis, formerly called _East India Myrrh_.[580]
This drug is of African origin, but of the plant which yields it
nothing is known. Vaughan[581] who sent a sample from Aden to one of
us in 1852, was told by the natives that the tree from which it is
collected resembles that affording _Heera Ból_ or true myrrh, but that
it is nevertheless distinct. The drug is exported from the whole Somali
coast to Mokha, Jidda, Aden, Makulla, the Persian Gulf, India and even
China.[582] Bombay official returns show that the quantity imported
thither in the year 1872-73, was 224 cwt, all shipped from Aden.
Some myrrh, no doubt that from the interior of north-eastern Africa,
the Habaghadi or Baisabole, finds its way by the country of the
Wagadain (Ugahden or Ogadain) to the small port of Brava (Barawa,
Braoua), about 1° N. lat., and to Zanzibar.[583] This is, possibly,
also the “_Mirra fina_” which is stated, about the year 1502, by Tomé
Lopez to be collected (?) in the island of “Monzambiche.”[584]
[578] Information obligingly supplied by Captain Hunter, July 1877.
[579] Dymock, _Pharm. Journ._ vi. (1876) 661.
[580] _Myrrha indica_, Martiny, _Encyklop. der med-pharm._
_Rohwaarenkunde_, ii. (1854) 98, 101.
[581] _Pharm. Journ._ xii. (1853) 227.
[582] In 1865, 10 packages of this drug containing about 15 cwt. were
consigned to me for sale in London by a friend in China, who had
purchased the drug under the notion that it was _true myrrh_. The
commodity was bad of its kind, and was sold with difficulty at 30_s._
per cwt.—D. H.
[583] Guillain, _Documents sur l’histoire, la géogr. et le commerce de
l’Afrique orientale_ iii. (1856) 350.
[584] In Ramusio (see Appendix, R) 239.
According to Vaughan, Bissa Bôl is mixed with the food given to milch
cows and buffaloes in order to increase the quantity and improve the
quality of their milk, and that it is also used as size to impart a
bright gloss to whitewashed walls.
Miles mentions[585] that myrrh, called there _hodthai_, is only used
in the Somali country, by men to whiten their shields (by means of an
emulsion made with the drug), by women to cleanse their hair. Probably
hodthai and habaghadi is one and the same thing.
Bissa Bôl differs from myrrh in its stronger, almost acrid _taste_
and in _odour_, which, when once familiar is easily recognizable;
fine specimens of the former have the outward characters of myrrh
and perhaps are often passed off for it. A good sample of “coarse”
habaghadi myrrh as sent in 1877 by Captain Hunter from Aden proved
to contain but very little resin. This resin is manifestly different
from that of myrrh as already shown by its paler, more reddish colour.
The resin of Bissa Bôl moreover is but very sparingly soluble in
bisulphide of carbon; this solution is _not altered_ by bromine, that
of true myrrh, as above stated, assuming a most intense violet colour
on addition of bromine. Nor is the resin of habaghadi soluble in
petroleum ether. Of the gummy substance, which is by far the prevailing
constituent of this drug, a small portion only is soluble in water.
These extremely marked differences no doubt depend upon a widely
discrepant composition of the resins of the two kinds of myrrh as well
as upon a different proportion of gum and resin. The Bissa Bôl usually
seen is an impure and foul substance, which is regarded by London
druggists as well as by the Banian traders in India as a very inferior
dark sort of myrrh.
2. _Arabian Myrrh_—The drug we have mentioned at p. 143 as collected to
the eastward of Aden, is of interest as substantiating the statement of
Theophrastus that both olibanum and myrrh grow in Southern Arabia.
The drug, which is not distinguished by any special name in English
trade, is in irregular masses seldom exceeding 1½ inches long, and
having a somewhat gummy-looking exterior. The larger lumps seem formed
by the cohesion of small, rounded, translucent, externally shining
tears or drops. The fracture is like that of common myrrh, but less
unctuous and wants the whitish markings. The odour and taste are those
of the ordinary drug. Pieces of a semi-transparent papery bark are
attached to some of the lumps. We extracted the resin of a sample of
this myrrh from the territory of the Fadhli, as sent to us by Captain
Hunter. Its solution in bisulphide of carbon or petroleum ether was
coloured by bromine as stated above, (p. 144) with regard to typical
myrrh (Heerabol) from the Somali Country. The name applies to myrrh
from the vicinity of Ras Morbat in the same region. But the resin of
another kind of Arabian myrrh, for which we are likewise indebted to
Captain Hunter, is _not coloured_ when treated in the same way. This is
the myrrh “Hodaidia Jebeli” from north and north-western Yenen.
[585] _Journ. of the R. Geogr. Soc._ 22 (1872) 64.