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1 "Eye dilating." Belladonna, a preparation from the Atropa belladonna, is now used in medicine for this purpose. A similar effect is attributed in B. xxv. c. 92, to the plant Anagallis. In reality, the application of prepared antimony would contract the eyelids, and so appear to enlarge the eyes. This property is peculiar, Ajasson remarks, to sulphuret of antimony, and sulphuret of antimony and silver.
2 Preparations "for beautifying the eyebrows." See B. xxi. c. 73, B. xxiii. c. 51, and B. xxxv. c. 56. Omphale, the Lydian queen, who captivated Hercules, is represented by the tragic poet Ion, as using "stimmi" for the purposes of the toilet. It was probably with a preparation of antimony that Jezebel "painted her face, and tired her head." 2 Kings, ix. 30. The "Kohl" used by the females in Egypt and Persia is prepared from antimony.
3 "Spuma argenti." See the next Chapter.
4 According to Dioscorides, it was prepared as a cosmetic by enclosing it in a lump of dough, and then burning it in the coals till reduced to a cinder. It was then extinguished with milk and wine, and again placed upon coals, and blown till ignition.
5 As to the "nitrum" of the ancients, see B. xxxi. c. 46.
6 "Flos"—literally the "flower."
7 "From this passage we may infer that the metal antimony was occasionally seen by the ancients, though not recognized by them as distinct from lead."—Dana's System of Mineralogy, p. 418. New York, 1850.
8 Pliny has here mistaken the sense of the word στέαρ, which in the passage of Dioscorides, B. v. c. 99, borrowed probably from the same source, evidently means dough, and not grease.
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