Treatise on Poisons In relation to medical jurisprudence, physiology, and the practice of physic

About this book

Robert Christison’s Treatise on Poisons is a comprehensive medical‑juridical handbook that opens with a candid author’s note, explaining a delay in publication and the incorporation of recent European toxicological research. The work is organized into two main parts: a systematic discussion of general poisoning, followed by detailed chapters on individual substances. The opening chapter already sets the tone, distinguishing local effects, corrosion, irritation, and pure nervous impressions, from remote actions, and illustrating each with examples ranging from mineral acids to opium. The extensive table of contents promises exhaustive coverage of acids, metals, plant toxins, gases, and even mechanical irritants, each paired with sections on tests, symptoms, morbid appearances, and treatment.

Written in the scholarly prose of mid‑nineteenth‑century Edinburgh, the text reflects the era’s meticulous, case‑based approach to forensic medicine. Its dense, systematic style will appeal to historians of science, scholars of legal medicine, and readers who relish detailed, period‑accurate explorations of toxicology rather than narrative storytelling.