Corpus of Electronic Texts Edition
An Irish Materia Medica (Author: Tadhg Ó Cuinn)

subsection 16

16. Alapin, cepa mairina, scilla: i.e. the three names of the Spanish onion; it is hot and dry in the second degree; it has dissolving, diuretic and cleaning virtues, and it has a killing virtue when it grows wild by itself, but it has the virtue of assisting the health when it is planted artificially in gardens. Some other people call it cepa marina, i.e. the sea onion; when it is put in medicines, it should be divided i.e. reject the outer part because it has the killing virtue, but apply the inner part for use in medicine and in the oximel called scilletorum, this oximel serves well to digest the matter in quotidian and quartan fevers, ileus and arthritis; boil the true onion in wine and oil, apply it to the surface over the liver and spleen, and it will help with their hardness and pain. Item, put squill for 15 days in wine and oil, boil it, afterwards put wax through it, make an ointment of it, and apply it to the surface over


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the liver and spleen, and it will cure their hardness and pain; boil it in vinegar and it will do the same thing. Note that the outer coats of it are too hot and intemperate, but the inner coats are temperate between hotness and coldness.