[One of Avicenna's electuaries: or on the difficulty of identifying the ingredients of ancient medications].

In view of the many thousands of existing plant varieties, it is sometimes difficult to determine which particular medicinal plant has been used in antiquity and during the middle ages. Scanty descriptions transmit often insufficient information to later generations of physicians and pharmacists trying to duplicate a prescribed medication. In the article a composite medication on xyloaloesbasis, taken from the Canon of Avicenna is used as an example to show the difficulties connected with the understanding of an ancient text. Quarrels more than a century ago between expert translators of old Arabic scientific works further illustrate the difficulties encountered with the interpretatiion of such texts. The example chosen provides furthermore an insight to the formerly neglected influence of old Indian medical tradition and gives an additional indication of the identity of Avicenna's ingredients.