#EMPIRE OF SIN POISON STILL SKIN#

Arsenic poisoning was difficult to detect as the symptoms initially mimicked food poisoning, but a single dose could produce severe diarrhoea and vomiting, paralysis, and death. White arsenic was readily made by heating arsenic ore, this produced a white crystalline powder which was soluble in water and virtually undetectable in food or drink, and some said it even improved the taste of wine. The odourless and tasteless properties of inorganic arsenic compounds such as arsenic trioxide (white arsenic) made them an ideal poison. Pedanius Dioscorides, author of the historical pharmacopeia De Materia Medica and a Greek physician in the court of the Roman Emperor Nero, described arsenic as a poison, which was used by Nero to poison his step-brother Tiberius Britannicus in 55 CE and secure his position as Roman Emperor. The toxic properties of arsenic were known by Hippocrates, who in 370 BCE described abdominal colic in a miner of metals, and similar properties were described of mercury and arsenic by Theophrastus of Erebus in the fourth century BCE and by Pliny the Elder in the first century BCE.

The Poison of Kings and the King of Poisons The word became arsenicum in Latin and arsenic in old French, from which the current English term is derived. The word arsenic is derived from the Persian zarnikh and Syriac zarniqa, later incorporated into ancient Greek as arsenikon, which meant “masculine” or “potent” and referred primarily to orpiment, or yellow arsenic. Inorganic arsenic compounds are more toxic than organic compounds, but organic arsenic compounds are converted to inorganic compounds when absorbed in biological systems. Common arsenic ores include arsenopyrite (grey arsenic, FeAsS), realgar or sandarach (red arsenic, AsS), orpiment (yellow arsenic, As 2S 3), and arsenolite, an oxidation product of arsenic sulphides (white arsenic, As 2O 3). Īrsenic is a metalloid element and is widely distributed in the earth’s crust, usually combined with other metals, sulphur or oxygen. In the early 19th century arsenicals were also developed to successfully treat trypanosomiasis, and currently arsenic trioxide is approved to treat refractory acute promyelocytic leukaemia. In 1918 two organic arsenical compounds, Lewisite and Adamsite, vesicant and respiratory irritant agents, were developed by the US Army as chemical warfare weapons but not in time to be used in the war both are still listed by the CDC as potential bioterrorism agents. Paul Ehrlich’s and Sahachiro Hata’s new therapeutic discovery in 1909 for treating syphilis, Salvarsan, was hailed as “the arsenic that saved”. It also has a place in medical history, particularly in the treatment of two great scourges of disease in our time, trypanosomiasis or “sleeping sickness”, and syphilis or the “great pox”. Nero used it to murder his stepbrother, Britannicus, so as he might become Emperor of Rome. It was used throughout history as a potent poison to kill off kings and emperors and facilitate rich inheritances.

#EMPIRE OF SIN POISON STILL SKIN#

It is ubiquitous in our environment and it is a potent neurological and liver toxin as well as a lung, bladder and skin carcinogen. Arsenic is a substance that has been well known to both the ‘healer’ and the ‘poisoner’ throughout history.

Empire of sin poison still