METHUSELAH ARCHIVE INGREDIENTS / GAMBOGE (GARCINIA GUM-RESIN PURGATIVE)

Gamboge (Garcinia gum-resin purgative)

botanical
provenance:botanical
first introduced:1825
regulatory status:withdrawn
context:Gamboge, a gum-resin from Garcinia trees long used in pharmacy as a drastic purgative, is named in the Dictionary of National Biography as a principal ingredient of the vegetable pills James Morison began selling in 1825. Morison kept the full formula of his Vegetable Universal Medicine secret (it was not published until the early twentieth century); gamboge is the component the biographical record identifies by name.
MECHANISM CLAIMED
Within Morison's Hygeian system the pill's vegetable purgatives were held to act by evacuating the impure matter of the blood through the bowels. On this account the more the bowels were opened the more thoroughly the blood was purified, so large and repeated doses were presented as both safe and beneficial.
MECHANISM ACTUAL
Gamboge is a violent cathartic with no blood-purifying action. It irritates the gastrointestinal tract to produce watery, often bloody diarrhoea, and in quantity it causes severe purging, dehydration, and collapse; it fell out of legitimate pharmacy as a dangerous and obsolete drug. The Hygeian premise that disease is impure blood expelled by purgation is a humoral idea not recognized by modern physiology.
INTERVENTIONS USING IT
EXTERNAL REFERENCES
NOTES

Gamboge is a gum-resin obtained from Garcinia trees, used historically in pharmacy as a drastic purgative and as a yellow pigment. The Dictionary of National Biography names it as a principal ingredient of Morison’s Vegetable Universal Medicine, the pill James Morison sold from 1825 through the British College of Health. Morison concealed the full recipe, which was not made public until the early twentieth century; gamboge is the constituent the biographical record fixes by name. In the Hygeian doctrine the pills worked by purging the supposed impurity of the blood through the bowels, so heavy dosing was marketed as harmless and even desirable. Gamboge has no such action: it is a harsh cathartic that, taken in the large quantities Morison’s agents administered, produced the severe purging implicated in deaths attributed to the pills.