Tes iatrikes kartos, or, A treatise de morborum capitis essentiis & pronosticis adorned with above three hundred choice and rare observations ... / by Robert Bayfield ...

CAP. CI. De Linguae Tumore.

TUmor Linguae, The Tumor or swelling of the tongue, ariseth either from a cholerick blood flowing unto it, (and then for the most part an Inflammation is excited) or from a wate∣rish (and then the tongue waxeth white) or else from a poisonous matter, as in the French dis∣ease.

Forestus speaks of a Brewer that had a great Inflammation of his tongue, which came to sup∣puration and brake.

Galen maketh mention of a certain man, whose tongue was so swoln by reason of Rheum which fell from his head, that he could not contain it in his mouth.

The same Author reports, that he saw a tongue which grew exceeding great, absque ullo sensu do∣loris, neither would it pit, or yield to the sin∣ger, but it was a bare increase of the quantity of the tongue, which came by too much nourish∣ment brought and converted into the substance of it.

Tumors of the tongue, for the most part, do not endanger the life, unless they grow so big that they cause suffocation: Si linguae tumor sit durus, lividus, & ad cancri naturam ferè tendens, incurabilis est.

A certain Gentlewoman being grievously af∣flicted with an inflammation of the tongue, in a burning Fever, was thus helped: First, there was taken away from the Cephalick vein four or five ounces of blood, although she had passed fourteen weeks of her time, being with child. The same day the following Gargarism was used. ℞ Aquae fontanae, lb. ii. julepi rosarum, ℥ i. ss. mellis mororum, ℥ vi. aceti rosacei, ℥ i. olei vitri∣oli, q. s. ut acidus sit; with this she washed her mouth, which brought away much flegm: Now and then the dry places were anointed with honey of Roses, and sometimes with Butter, and so she was cured.

Galen cured a Patient of sixty years, whose tongue was very much inflamed, only by wash∣ing it with the juyce of Lettice, after purging.

Zacutus Lusitanus, in a desperate case, when the tongue of his Patient grew to a wonderful bigness, so that he feared suffocation, after empty∣ing and re-velling medicines used in vain apply∣ed four Hors-leeches to the tongue, and in a short time, after plentiful bleeding, it became thin and small, and the Patient escaped.

The same Author declares, that he cured a

child of ten years old, who had a tongue swol∣len by defluxion, so big that it could not be con∣tained in his mouth (after revulsions by bleed∣ing, cupping-glasses with scarification, and sharp Clysters) because the Tumor was soft and loose, only by profound scarification of the tongue; and after he commanded that it should be washed with Salt water, from whence there came such abundance of humors that the child presently recovered.

A certain person, by reason of the too frequent use of Mercurial Unguents, had his tongue so swelled (from the violence of the Flux which followed thereupon) that it hung out of his mouth the breadth of four fingers: He continu∣ed in this condition by the space of four months, and his tongue being altered by the air was grown three fingers thick. Mr. Des Grands Prez, a most expert Physician of Greenoble, being sent for after bleeding, washing of the part, and a Seton fastned to the neck, took down the swel∣ling thereof, chiefly by the use of a pouder fra∣med of Pepper, Ginger, Mustard-seed, and parch∣ed Salt.