The Curative Role of Bitumen in Traditional Persian Medicine

AIM: Bitumen is a natural substance effusing from rocks' notches in some highland areas; it has been known as an effective remedy for treating some illnesses. Considering pain relieving properties of bitumen in traditional Persian medicine (TPM) sources, this study aims to review the viewpoints of TPM sages regarding bitumen in the context of traditional Persian medicine. It also provides applicable information for interested researchers to conduct well-designed clinical trials and evaluate therapeutic effects of bitumen claimed in TPM sources. MATERIAL AND METHOD: Various databases including Embase, SID, IRANDOC, IranMedex, Scopus and PubMed were searched with keywords "bitumen" and "Shilajit". Furthermore, main traditional Persian medicine sources including Avicenna's "Canon of medicine", "Continens Liber" by Razes, "The storehouse of medicaments" by Aghili, "Gift for the faithful" by Momen Tonekaboni and "Measure for medicine" written by Muhammad Akbar Shah Arzani were reviewed with Persian keywords "Moomiaii" and "Mumnaei" Results: According to TPM sources, bitumen was used by Iranian's physicians to treat a wide range of diseases. It was known especially as an effective remedy to improve gastrointestinal digestive problems. CONCLUSION: Bitumen is cited in traditional Persian medicine sources as an effective remedy for treatment of a wide range of diseases, especially GI disorders and bone pain. Recent studies showed the beneficial effects of bitumen in treatment of wound healing, however using it in medical practice for other health dilemma should be confirmed by conducting well-designed clinical studies in the future.

Identification, Geochemical Characterisation and Significance of Bitumen among the Grave Goods of the 7th Century Mound 1 Ship-Burial at Sutton Hoo (Suffolk, UK).

The 7th century ship-burial at Sutton Hoo is famous for the spectacular treasure discovered when it was first excavated in 1939. The finds include gold and garnet jewellery, silverware, coins and ceremonial armour of broad geographical provenance which make a vital contribution to understanding the political landscape of early medieval Northern Europe. Fragments of black organic material found scattered within the burial were originally identified as 'Stockholm Tar' and linked to waterproofing and maintenance of the ship. Here we present new scientific analyses undertaken to re-evaluate the nature and origin of these materials, leading to the identification of a previously unrecognised prestige material among the treasure: bitumen from the Middle East. Whether the bitumen was gifted as diplomatic gesture or acquired through trading links, its presence in the burial attests to the far-reaching network within which the elite of the region operated at this time. If the bitumen was worked into objects, either alone or in composite with other materials, then their significance within the burial would certainly have been strongly linked to their form or purpose. But the novelty of the material itself may have added to the exotic appeal. Archaeological finds of bitumen from this and earlier periods in Britain are extremely rare, despite the abundance of natural sources of bitumen within Great Britain. This find provides the first material evidence indicating that the extensively exploited Middle Eastern bitumen sources were traded northward beyond the Mediterranean to reach northern Europe and the British Isles.

[Use of bitumen in medicine throughout the ages]. / Usage du bitume en médecine au cours des âages.

Bitumen, which results of the storage of organic material and of the decomposition in process of time, was used since ancient times for cosmetic, art and the caulk of boats. So, mummies were treated by bitumen to improve their preservation. But bitumen was held to be useful to cure varying pulmonary, digestive, ENT troubles and even to set fractures. Besides, bitumen was used to realize the first photograph. In Iran, bitumen is yet used to improve the quality of the skin, but mixed with to limit its toxicity.

A database of archived drilling records of the drill cuttings piles at the North West Hutton oil platform.

Drill cuttings piles are found underneath several hundred oil platforms in the North Sea, and are contaminated with hydrocarbons and chemical products. This study characterised the environmental risk posed by the cuttings pile at the North West Hutton (NWH) oil platform. Data on the drilling fluids and chemical products used over the platform's drilling history were transferred from archived well reports into a custom database, to which were added toxicological and safety data. Although the database contained many gaps, it established that only seven chemical products used at NWH were not in the lowest category of the Offshore Chemicals Notification Scheme, and were used in only small quantities. The study therefore supports the view that the main environmental risk posed by cuttings piles comes from hydrocarbon contamination. The (dated) well records could help future core sampling to be targeted at specific locations in the cuttings piles. Data from many platforms could also be pooled to determine generic 'discharge profiles.' Future study would benefit from the existence, in the public domain, of a standardised, 'legacy' database of chemical products.

A distinct break between butane and pentane.

In organic chemistry, hydrocarbon compounds with one to four carbon atoms are given individual names such as methane, ethane, propane and butane, whereas those with five carbons or more are named by the serial Greco-Roman numerals like pentane pente, 5), hexane hex, 6 (and heptane hepta, 7). The author points out a distinct conceptual break between the numbers four and five. There have been arguments that primitive cultures had numerals only up to four, and a quantum mental leap was required to cross the boundary after four. Linguistic discussions are made to substantiate the break by scrutinizing the spellings of the numbers "five", "eight" and "nine" of the proto-Indo-European language. In ancient Roman times, 1 (children's ages were counted by winters up to four and by years from five on, 2 (the first four calender months had real names and after four they were called by serial numbers, (3) children up to the fourth were given individual names but from the fifth child on they were named by serial number words, and (4) the words of the number of times had a sharp break between four and five. In various Indo-European languages long ago, the numbers one through four were inflected adjectives, while the numbers beyond four were non-inflectable. All the above observations indicate an existence of a conceptual break after the number four. The author concludes that the notion of such break latently survived in peoples' minds for a long time and came to light when naming of the hydrocarbons was attempted in the 19th century.