STAMP NO. II.—CONTAINED IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM.
This large stamp consists (Plate I., No. II.[460]) of a flat
quadrilateral stone, about an inch and a half broad, and engraved upon
three of its sides. A portion of one corner of the stone is broken off.
The probable deficiency which is thus produced in one of the
inscriptions is supplied in this, and in some other similar instances in
the sequel, by Italic letters. The three inscriptions read as follow:—
1. SEX: JUL: SEDATI
CROCOD PACCIAN
2. SEX: JUL: SEDATI CRO-
CODES DIALEPIDOS
3. (_Sex_): JUL: SEDATI CRO-
(_cod_)ES AD DIATHES
The name of the oculist—SEXTUS JULIUS SEDATUS—is imperfect on the
third or broken side, the prænomen “SEX” being wanting on that side in
the first line, and the middle syllable “COD” of the word Crocodes being
also wanting, from the same cause, in the second line.
The restored reading of this third side—viz., SEXTI JULII SEDATI
CROCODES AD DIATHES_es_—need not be dwelt upon, as it is so very
similar to that on one side of the Tranent stone. The other two sides
contain the names of two new varieties of crocodes.
One of these varieties—the CROCODES PACCIANUM—received its name from
Paccius, a celebrated Roman medical practitioner, who either invented
this special collyrium, or brought it into repute. Paccius, who lived
about the commencement of the Christian era, is said to have amassed a
fortune by the sale of a secret nostrum. At his death he bequeathed the
prescription for it to the Emperor Tiberius, who placed a copy of it in
the various public libraries.[461] In the list of his ophthalmic
medicines, Galen gives formulæ for various collyria invented by Paccius,
such as the “_Sphragis Paccii_,”[462] “_Asclepiadeum Paccii_,”[463]
“_Collyrium_ ex terra Samia _Paccii Ophthalmici_ ad affectus intensos
(επιτεταμενας διαθεσεις).”[464] Galen does not give any recipe
for the _Crocodes_ of Paccius; but it was evidently a collyrium duly
esteemed at the time in which he wrote; for, in his chapter on ulcers of
the eyes, he specially names the “CROCODES PACCIANUM,”[465] and
recommends its use in cases in which the accompanying inflammation has
already ceased, and at the stage when a stimulating application becomes
necessary.
The other variety of crocodes used by Sedatus is the CROCODES
DIALEPIDOS. A formula for _Dialepidos_ is given by Marcellus,[466] with
the crocus as the first ingredient mentioned in its composition. The
_Dialepidos_ derived its name from its containing the scales—(λεπιδες)
of burnt copper, or the black peroxide of that metal,—a preparation
which Dioscorides (lib. v. cap. 89) describes as useful in eye-diseases;
and which Galen declares to be a “medicamentum multo utilissimum,” vol.
xii. p. 223.