Mithradates’ antidote: A pharmacological ghost

Totelin, Laurence Marie Victoria ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9576-1643 2004. Mithradates’ antidote: A pharmacological ghost. Early Science and Medicine 9 (1) , pp. 1-19. 10.1163/1573382041153179

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Abstract

Two kinds of sources are available to the historian to reconstruct the first centuries of the history of Mithradates' antidote: biographical information on Mithradates' interests in medicine, and a series of recipes. In this paper I argue that we cannot reconstruct the original recipe of Mithridatium from our existing sources. Instead, I examine how the Romans remodelled the history of the King's death and used the royal name to create a "Roman" drug. This drug enjoyed a huge popularity in the first centuries of the Roman Empire. An Emperor, Marcus Aurelius, consumed it as well as members of the upper class; and many highly literate physicians recommended it notwithstanding the medical sect they were belonging to. With all its expensive ingredients, and its claim to work as a panacea, Mithridatium responded to a real demand in a Roman Empire at its commercial and political apogee.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	History, Archaeology and Religion
Subjects:	D History General and Old World > DE The Mediterranean Region. The Greco-Roman World
Publisher:	Brill Academic Publishers
ISSN:	1383-7427
Last Modified:	20 Oct 2022 08:30
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/28599

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