Animal magic - the Burges collection of materia medica

摘要

Using a lotion made with bees to promote hair growth or ground-up human skull to cure epilepsy seems ridiculous today, but for centuries treatments like these were the height of pharmaceutical knowledge. The Burges collection was put together by the apothecary John Burges (1745-1807). It contains more than 1,000 specimens, including 'unicorn horn' and a mummified human hand. They illustrate the medicinal ingredients - animal, vegetable and mineral - found in the pharmacopoeias of the early 1700s.