Bezoar stone
From the Persian panzehr or the Arabic badzehr, “counterpoison”
- Known today as
- A concretion formed in the stomach of goats and other animals.
- Kind
- Animal, in 2 older authorities
- Constituents
- ellagic acid, hair
- Earliest authority here
- The Arabic physicians
Revised October 3, 2026: Tradition, lore, modern assessment, and sources extended. Checked against its sources, each read in full, in part, or in its abstract. Version 1, first published September 25, 2026.
Bezoar stone: what does modern science say?
No bezoar is a universal antidote: Paré’s trial showed that it could not cure all poisons. Today the word names not an antidote but a medical problem: a bezoar in a human stomach, from swallowed hair or persimmons, may need endoscopic or surgical removal.
Pharmacognosy & Toxicology
- Constituents
- ellagic acid ChEMBL72–89 per cent of goat bezoar, with urolithins
- hairin the hair bezoars of the human stomach
- Mechanism
- A stone that grows little by little, in scales like an onion’s, in the stomach of a goat (Paré). Paré tested it on a condemned cook given sublimate, who died within seven hours; bezoars were used above all as antidotes to arsenic, the poison most used in European courts (Barroso, 2013).
- Standing
- Out of use since about 1800 (Barroso); Paré had already told the king that no antidote serves against all poisons, each needing its own contrary.
- Paré, A. (1575). Les Oeuvres, book on poisons; trans. Johnson (1634). Read in part · the text read
- Barroso, M. D. S. (2013). “Bezoar stones, magic, science and art,” in A History of Geology and Medicine. Geological Society Special Publication 375. Abstract read · the text read
The abstract of each source, beneath its citation. For Club members. About the Club or sign in.
Constituent names open the compound’s record at PubChem, and “ChEMBL” beside a name opens its record at ChEMBL, the European Bioinformatics Institute’s database of bioactive molecules. Where a mechanism line was checked against ChEMBL (ChEMBL 37, read 1 October 2026), the check is shown with the measured value and its source paper, or says plainly that nothing has been measured. Doses are as the references give them, for description only; this is not medical advice. Each source carries the result of its check against Crossref, PubMed, or the authority’s page: see Verification.
What Medicine Makes of It
- The PlagueThe pomander and the vinegar, the flea and the bacillus.
- The Universal AntidoteBezoar, unicorn, and theriac against every poison, and what replaced them.
Bezoar stone: what lore surrounds it?
Kings owned them and had some mounted as jewels.
Paré’s cook took sublimate and then the stone, and died within seven hours; the king commanded the stone to be burned. In the sixteenth century a bezoar was worth ten times its weight in gold.
Bezoar stone: what did the older authorities say?
- The Arabic physicians
- Brought it into Western medicine in the twelfth century, as an antidote to arsenic (Barroso); Paré gives its Arabic name, Bedezahar, “the preservers of life.”
- Ambroise Paré
- Recounts that a cook condemned to hang accepted poison in exchange for his life if the bezoar saved him; it did not, and he died in agony.
Sources
- Ambroise Paré, Œuvres. Primary text
- Paré, A. (1575). Œuvres, “Discours de la licorne.” Primary text
- Eng, K., and Kay, M. (2012). Gastrointestinal bezoars: history and current treatment paradigms. Gastroenterology & Hepatology 8: 776–778. Read in full · the text read
- Fung, H.-Y., et al. (2025). Quality analysis of raw material and products of goat bezoar (Houzao), a mysterious traditional medicine. Phytochemical Analysis 36: 2182–2196. Read in full · the text read
Verification
- Checked
- October 1, 2026, and October 3, 2026
- Passes
- Every sentence read against its sources, in the pass over the remaining 343 entries
- The Standing line checked against the authority it names (EMA, WHO, FDA, CITES, Commission E)
- Every dated or regulatory claim checked by category across the database
- Every source read, in full, in part, or in its abstract, and every sentence checked against what was read (October 3, 2026)
- Sources
- 6 cited: 2 read in full, 1 read in part, 1 abstract read, 2 primary text. 1 with the abstract on file.
- Corrections
- (and the antidote reading): the Scripps test of bezoars against arsenic was in the late 1960s, not a single stated year; Paré's test on the cook was 1567 (three places).
- Arrhenius and Benson's laboratory finding now dated to the late 1960s.
What was checked, how, and what was found is set out on the Verification page. A checked source is one whose record was found; it does not make the entry medical advice.
Cite This Entry
Version 1 · first published September 25, 2026 · last revised October 3, 2026
- Chicago
“Bezoar stone.” In Materia Medica, edited by B. C. P. Statema. Version 1. The Thinking Press, 2026–. Last modified October 3, 2026. https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/bezoar-stone.
- MLA
“Bezoar stone.” Materia Medica, edited by B. C. P. Statema, version 1, The Thinking Press, 3 Oct. 2026, thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/bezoar-stone. Accessed 8 Oct. 2026.
- APA
Bezoar stone. (2026, October 3). In B. C. P. Statema (Ed.), Materia medica (Version 1). The Thinking Press. Retrieved October 8, 2026, from https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/bezoar-stone
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See Also
Sharing ellagic acid
Also in Ambroise Paré
Mummy in Ambroise Paré · Unicorn’s horn in Ambroise Paré · everything Ambroise Paré names →
Nearby in the alphabet
Birch polypore (A white bracket of dead birch) · Betony (Betonica officinalis) · Benzoin (the resin of Styrax benzoin of Sumatra) · Bitter aloes (A) · Ben-nut (Moringa oleifera (or M) · Black hellebore (Helleborus niger) · Bells (and wrongly, called their “baptism)
Historical description, not medical advice.