LAURUS NOBILIS apothecary uses

Bay laurel is an evergreen plant from the Mediterranean area and it has a long history among the classical civilizations. For the Greeks and the Romans it was mostly an ornamental plant used in gardens, for garlands and offered to the winners in sports or poetic competitions but also to heroic soldiers. The laurel wreath became a symbol of victory.

Both its leaves and berries were used for medicinal purposes as they contain an essential oil with a high concentration of eucalyptol. The plant has narcotic and carminative properties, calming abdominal pain and favoring the evacuation of intestinal gas. In apothecary works from Transylvania bay laurel was also recommended as a stimulant.

Ripe laurel berries

Dried laurel berries

The History of Pharmacy Collection in Cluj-Napoca includes five jars for pharmaceutical products obtained from the leaves and especially the berries of bay laurel. Three of the items are included in he monthly FOCUS display for April 2017, presenting the history of various apothecary ingredients.  One glass jar with the painted signature “Pulv. (alchemical symbol) Bacc. Lauri” (laurel berry powder) was used during the 19th century in the Molnar pharmacy from Oradea and there are also two jars made of wood. The one with the signature “Pul. Lauri a Bacc” (laurel berry powder) dates from the 18th century and was acquired through an older donation, while the one marked “Fruct Lauri” (bay laurel fruits) inside a cartouche with decorative ribbon and has been used in the Unicorn Pharmacy in Cluj.

19th-century glass jar for laurel berry powder, using the alchemical symbol for powder.

19th-cenury wooden apothecary jar with decorated cartouche

 

18th-century wooden apothecary jar inscribed Pulv. Lauri a Bacc (bay laurel berry powder)

A history of Aloe vera

Aloe vera - FOCUS February 2017 at the History of Pharmacy Collection in Cluj-Napoca

The plant Aloe barbadensis or Aloe vera has a long history of medicinal use, for over three millennia. The Egyptians first used it to treat sun burns and intestinal parasites. In the sixth century the Arabs used it as laxative. Dioscorides recommended Aloe vera in afflictions of the digestive tract, of the mouth and of the skin. Aristotle presumably suggested Alexander the Great to conquer the island of Socotra, where aloe was cultivated, in order to ensure its constant supply. It seems that the plant was the secret ingredient in Cleopatra’s beauty treatments. Aloe was also popular among the Romans, described by Pliny the Elder in his famous book Naturalis Historia.

 Apothecary jars for aloe used in Baia Mare (present-day Romania)

For a long time, between the sixth century B.C. and 1673, the plant was only cultivated on the island of Socotra, east of Africa (today part of Yemen), reason for which one of its names was Aloe Succotor or Succotrina. In the seventeenth century the English started to import it from the Barbados Islands, calling the species Aloe Barbadensis.

Wooden apothecary jar for aloe from the Unicorn Pharmacy in Cluj-Napoca

          The History of Pharmacy Collection in Cluj-Napoca includes five jars for aloe, either as extract or powder. All of the items are dated to the nineteenth century and were used in various pharmacies: Baia Mare (the wooden jars inscribed PULV ALOES and ALOE), Cluj – the Unicorn pharmacy (the wooden jar with the signature ALOE SUCCOTOR), Tuda – the Velits pharmacy (the ceramic jar inscribed EX ALOES AQ) and Oradea – The Golden Cross pharmacy (the wooden jar marked ALOES LUCIDA – containing transparent or glassy aloe). These jars and a sample of the plant are exhibited in February part of the thematic display FOCUS - exhibit of the month.

Pharmaceutical jar for glassy aloe from Oradea

Ceramic jar from the old apothecary shop in Turda, near Cluj

Lapis pumicis (pumice stone)

Pumice stone is one of the natural ingredients employed by the apothecaries and doctors of old. Pumex or Lapis Pumicis is a porous volcanic rock with low density and light color. It was sometimes called, erroneously, Sea foam (in fact sepiolite). Basaltic scoria is another vitreous volcanic stone, dark in color, denser and with larger vesicles, used more rarely in apothecary context.

Lapis pumicis

Scoria

Pumice powder was used as ingredient (mechanical abrasive cleaning agent) in tooth powders (dentifrices), in medicine against ulcers (of the skin and cornea) and as scar removal. The entire stone was sometimes employed by pharmacists as a kind of file, to scrape other materials. Together with other ingredients (antimony, distilled water, walnut shells etc.) it was boiled into concoctions for diet (Decoctum Lusitanicum) or urinary problems.

The History of Pharmacy Collection in Cluj presents the ingredient in its FOCUS display for the month of October 2016. The tematic display includes actual pumice and scoria stones and one 19th-century wooden jar from the “Unicorn” Pharmacy in Cluj, with the signature Pulv. Pumicis Lap. As the Latin abbreviated inscription indicates, the jar was used for the storage of powdered pumice stone. Another relevant objects in the collection is a valuable 17th century closet from the Officina, once used in the “Black Eagle” Pharmacy in Sibiu. One of its drawers of the  is also inscribed Lap. Pumicis. (pumice stone). More recent still, a similar inscription - Pulv. Lap. Pumic. - is to be found on a 20th century closet from the Hintz Pharmacy which houses the museum.

Objectualizing cameras

Many a photographer (and not only them) are so passionate about their work that they end up worshiping the tools of their trade, i.e. cameras. I think this is rather a cute conceptual switch, seeing how pieces of equipment meant to focus on certain aspects of reality become themselves the focus. Cameras are being photographed (perfect inversion!), painted, turned into ceramic sculptures, jewelry items, and the topic of various artistic techniques of representation including embroidery, linocut, graffiti, engravings and many more.

My latest Etsy treasury tackles precisely this fashion of having photographic cameras as subject of art and crafts. They are not only pas-par-totum symbols of a trade and a revolutionary way of recording/capturing reality, but became the focus of artistic inspiration and vision.