The bunias or turnip, when eaten after being twice boiled, is nutritious,
no less so than other herbs, but when frequently taken it engenders
thick juices. The bulbi are astringent and detergent, whet the appetite,
strengthen the stomach, and evacuate the viscid humours contained in the
chest. When twice boiled, they are more nourishing, but less expectorant,
having lost their bitter principle. They are productive of semen, and
aphrodisiacal when liberally used, and occasion flatulence and griping.
When eaten with fish-sauce and oil, they are very sweet, do not create
flatulence, are nutritious and digestible. The garden and wild carrot
and the caraway have roots which are less nutritious than turnip, but
hot, decidedly aromatic, and diuretic. But when used too freely, they
supply bad juices, and become of difficult digestion, like other roots.
Some call the wild carrot daucus; it is evidently more diuretic than
the other. The radish is of an attenuant and heating nature; but may be
eaten before other food along with vinegar and fish-sauce, to loosen
the bowels, but by no means after a meal. The onion, garlic, leek, and
dog-leek (_ampeloprason_), being of an acrid nature, warm the body,
attenuate and cut the thick humours contained in it; when twice boiled,
they give little nourishment, but when unboiled they do not nourish at
all. The garlic is more deobstruent and diaphoretic than the others;
and the dog-leek, being wild, is drier than the common leek. Regarding
pot-herbs in general, the raw, when eaten, furnish worse juices than
the boiled, as they have more excrementitious juice. But those which
are prepared for pickles with brine or vinegar and salt are stomachic,
and whet the appetite, and discuss crude humours; but are of difficult
digestion, and supply bad juices when too freely taken.
* * * * *
COMMENTARY. Galen thus delivers the general character of these
substances: The roots of pot-herbs which are acrid, such as those of
onions, leeks, garlic, radish, and carrot, contain bad juices; but those
of turnips, rapes, and caraways hold an intermediate place between things
of good and of bad juices.
It is well known that the Romans had two kinds of herbs with esculent
roots, called the napus and rapum, and that they are generally admitted
to have been two species of the turnip. See Columella (de R. Rust. ii,
10); Pliny (H. N. xviii, 13) and the note of Harduin; Sprengel (R. H.
H. t. i.) The term bunias occurs first in Nicander; and that it was
synonymous with the gongylis is declared by Galen and our author; and,
further, that it was the _brassica napobrassica_ L., or wild navew,
is admitted by all the late authorities on classical botany, with the
exception of Dierbach, who most unaccountably contends that it is the
_B. oleracea_. Galen says that unless well boiled it is indigestible,
flatulent, and bad for the stomach. Seth assigns it the same qualities as
our author. All account it diuretic and aphrodisiacal. Apicius directs
the rapa and napi to be eaten with cumin, rue, vinegar, oil, &c. (iii,
13.) Cato the Censor was very fond of turnips, and used to prepare them
with his own hands. It appears from Athenæus that the ancients frequently
ate their turnips roasted. They also ate turnips prepared as a pickle
with vinegar and mustard at the commencement of a feast, as whetters.
(Deipnos. iv, 11.) According to Diphilus, in this state they are more
attenuant than in their natural state. (Deipnos. ix, 8.)
It is not well ascertained what the esculent bulbi of the ancients were.
Harduin conjectures that they were a delicious kind of onions. Matthiolus
and Nonnius are wholly undecided. Sprengel inclines, with Dalecampius
and Sibthorp, to think that they were a species of muscari, or musk
hyacinth. The account given of them by Serapion, who calls them _capæ
sine tunicis_, agrees better with the conjecture of Harduin. Eustathius
likewise says that the bulbus was a wild onion. (Ad Iliad. xiii, 589.)
Columella, Varro, Apicius, and Martial call them aphrodisiacal.
The staphylinus was probably the carrot, or _daucus carota_, but we are
inclined to think that it also comprehended the parsnip. See Athen.
(Deip. ix, 2.) Apicius, among other methods of dressing it, directs it to
be done with salt, pure oil, and vinegar.
The sisarum was probably the garden parsnip, _pastinaca sativa_ L.
The carus seems indisputably to have been the _carum carui_ L.
Dioscorides says that its boiled root may be eaten like the carrot.
Seth praises it as being carminative, diuretic, and astringent. Apicius
mentions it frequently along with spices and other aromatics.
The characters of the onion, garlic, and leek are taken from Galen.
Celsus calls them calefacient, and ranks them with things having
unwholesome juices. Actuarius prefers the leek to the onion and garlic.
The latter is warmly eulogised by Galen, as being the rustic’s theriac.
Horace had not so much favour for it. (Epod. iii.) Galen calls the
ampeloprason the same as the wild leek. (De Fac. Simp. vi.) Dioscorides
describes two species of the porrum, namely, the capitatum and sectivum.
The asphodel (_asphodelus ramosus_) is mentioned as an article of food by
the poet Hesiod. Galen, however, speaks of its being eaten only in times
of scarcity.
Galen directs radishes to be eaten before dinner, as a laxative. He
justly expresses his surprise at the practice of certain physicians,
and other persons of his time, who ate radish after dinner to promote
digestion. The wild radish was called armoracia by the Romans, as we are
informed by Dioscorides.