送交者: fagus 于 2005-4-19, 10:41:43:
The Silphion story
http://www-ang.kfunigraz.ac.at/~katzer/engl/generic_frame.html?Silphion.html
Gernot Katzer's Spice Pages, an annotated list of plants used for spices currently and in former days,
explaining the probably use of Silphion as a spice.
http://ancient-coins.com/articles/silphium/silphium2.htm
Images of ancient coins showing the Silphion plant.
Schippmann, U. (1995): The Silphion story. � Medical Plant Conservation 1:2-4.
Summarizing the story of the Silphion plant.
Riddle, J.M. & Estes, W. (1992): Oral contraceptives in ancient and medieval medicines. � American
Scientist 80: 226-233
An overview about birth control by natural drugs in former times.
Seidemann, J.(1992): Durch Raubbau ausgerottete Pflanzen. Erst heute? � Naturwiss. Rundschau 45:
429-431.
The Silphion story
Silphion is the name of an ancient, almost certainly extinct plant known only from stylized images
used on the ancient coins of Kyrenaika (modern-day Libya). The plant was valued in ancient times
because of its many uses as a food source, seasoning for food, and, most importantly, as a
medication, especially for contraception. It occurred abundantly on coins minted between 570 and
250 BC, thus it must have been be an important good for merchandizing. From 250 BC onwards,
Silphion begins to disappear from the coins � coinciding with changes in the political system of the
city, where local residents were put out of power by governors who may have tried to maximize the
short-term benefits of the utilization of the plant.
This plant, very probably belonging to the Apiaceae genus Ferula, seems to constitute the first
known case of a plant driven to extinction by man. Today, the image of the plant as known from the
coins is the logo of the Medical plant specialist group of the IUCN, which tries to realize a
sustainable use of wild and cultivated medical plants around the globe.