Julius Caesar is said to have kept a reserve in the Roman treasury. According to Pliny the Elder, Emperor Nero (37-68 AD) possessed the last known stem. Some authors have also argued that the frequency of extramarital affairs among the Roman elites would have led to such a demand for this plant that it would have caused its total disappearance. But what are we talking about?
Silphium: a now extinct plant that once grew wild in what is now Libya. Used as a contraceptive and abortifacient, but also as a remedy, condiment, perfume and even to improve breeding, its exceptional properties made it one of the most precious goods of Greco-Roman Antiquity. Then, one day, she disappeared.
A powerful resin
Silphium is often described today as an aphrodisiac, although no ancient sources confirm this. Some of its oldest depictions show a heart-shaped pod, which could be the origin of this association.
Images on coins and figurines have led modern botanists to wonder whether silphium was related to large wild fennels (of the genus Ferula). However, we know that it is not related to plants of the genus Silphiumlike the laciniate silphia or the perfoliate silphia, in North America.
Depictions of silphium alongside gazelles (another iconic wealth of Libya) suggest that its stems typically reached around 30 centimeters in height. A resin was extracted from the stems and roots of the plant, then preserved in flour, which allowed its transport from Libya to more distant lands.
The Romans called this resin “laser” Or “laserpicium”. The best laserpicium was extracted from the root, but a lower quality version could also come from the stem. Before the Romans, the Greeks also used silphium. It was so important in some regional economies that it frequently appeared on coins.
The Greeks did not appear to harvest silphium themselves. They received it as tribute from Libyan tribes, who lived in contact with it and mastered its harvest and preparation. The Greeks of these regions capitalized on and exploited this indigenous knowledge, creating and supplying a market for silphium. This pattern of appropriation and valorization of the local knowledge of indigenous peoples remains a characteristic of the contemporary globalized economy.
A “food”
Silphium often appears in ancient medical treatises, where it is most often administered through food. The modern distinction between food and medicine was not obvious at the time: remedies were incorporated into very simple preparations, such as lentil porridge.
In Greco-Roman medicine, silphium was considered a “windy” food, believed to remove blockages that cause disease. These foods were also believed to affect reproduction, preventing conception or causing miscarriage, depending on when they were consumed.
In his treatise on gynecology in four volumes, written at the beginning of IIe century AD, the Greco-Roman physician Soranos of Ephesus explains that strong-tasting herbs and spices – including silphium – could be mixed with wine or simple foods to serve as oral contraceptives. He specifies, however, that these preparations often caused digestive problems.
Soranos of Ephesus also offers preventive methods in the form of suppositories: coating the cervix with substances such as aged olive oil, honey, resin, balsam, white lead, myrtle oil, moistened alum, galbanum resin (a plant close to silphium used in perfumery), or even placing a small pad of fine wool there. These are not strictly speaking medications, but substances whose properties – antibacterial, spermicidal or simply mechanical – could reduce the chances of conception.
Searching in texts written by men for traces of women’s medicine obviously has its limits. It is very likely that knowledge about pregnancy, contraception and abortifacients circulated mainly between women and that much of it was never recorded in the ancient medical treatises that have come down to us. We also have no proof of the effectiveness of silphium as a contraceptive or abortifacient, quite simply because there is no longer any left to test.
A persistent enigma
Silphium resisted any attempt at cultivation, making it a limited resource. Its financial value – and the control exercised by the state – seems to have sparked local tensions: in Roman times, accounts speak of acts of sabotage and peasants leading their livestock to graze on the plants.
Climate change and the desertification of the North African coast could have led to its extinction. If the Romans already considered silphium to have disappeared in the 1ster century AD, it could in fact have continued to be used locally until the 5the century.
Several attempts have been made to find possible remains of silphium in the modern world, but researchers cannot agree on a single surviving plant. Silphium may have been an asexually reproducing hybrid, making it both difficult to cultivate and particularly vulnerable.
In 2021, a new species of large fennel (Ferula drudeana) was identified around ancient Greek settlement sites in Anatolia, in central present-day Türkiye. It closely resembles ancient representations of silphium.
#History | Silphium, a plant with many medicinal and taste properties, was all the rage in the Mediterranean basin until its extinction. 2,000 years later, a Turkish researcher believes he has finally found a survivor of the miracle plant. https://t.co/aWYLXCC13e
— National Geographic FR (@NatGeoFR) October 2, 2022
It is possible that seeds from Libya reached Turkey and survived until today. But as long as we do not have seeds of ancient silphium clearly identified in well-dated archaeological contexts, this hypothesis will remain impossible to verify.
Many species of large fennel are present around the Mediterranean basin, but the dissemination of erroneous information about their supposed aphrodisiac properties – particularly for treating erectile dysfunction – still arouses growing concerns today linked to their overexploitation.
