# Laudanum

*Sydenham’s laudanum*

**Known today as.** A tincture of opium in wine, with saffron, cinnamon, and cloves.

Kind: Compound  
Poisoning: Opioid poisoning (https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/poisons/opioid)  
Deadly: yes

> **Deadly.** Addictive; overdose stops the breath.

## What was it used for?

For pain, sleeplessness, coughs, and the flux; in nineteenth-century England so widely used that it was taken for granted for self-medication.

## What does modern science say?

Opium tincture is still made for severe diarrhoea; laudanum was sold without a prescription until the early twentieth century and is now recognised as addictive. In Britain the Pharmacy Act of 1868 required those who sold poisons to be examined and registered, though its full force took twenty-five years to be felt; in the United States the Harrison Act of 1914 restricted the manufacture and distribution of opiates, laudanum among them. The deodorised tincture of opium that remains is a controlled drug for diarrhoea and has been used for the withdrawal of infants born to opioid-dependent mothers. The modern tincture holds 10 mg of morphine in each millilitre.

## Pharmacognosy and toxicology

- **morphine**: 10 mg per millilitre of the modern tincture
- **codeine**: 
- **ethanol**: the vehicle

**Mechanism.** As opium.

**Standing.** Deodorised tincture of opium remains a controlled drug for severe diarrhoea.

## What lore surrounds it?

See [Opium poppy](https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/opium-poppy).

Coleridge was a laudanum addict, and his opium-induced writing of *Kubla Khan* was famously interrupted by “a person on business from Porlock”; Mary Lincoln, the President’s wife, was another. Wilkie Collins based the laudanum of *The Moonstone* (1868) on his own experience of it. De Quincey, in the *Confessions*, reckoned twenty-five drops of laudanum to the grain of opium and at his height took eight thousand drops a day.

## What did the older authorities say?

**Thomas Sydenham.** Published his formula of opium in sherry with saffron, cinnamon, and cloves, set in a vapour bath for two or three days and strained.

**Thomas De Quincey.** Described the pleasures and pains of laudanum in his *Confessions* (1821).

**The Victorian chemist.** Sold it without prescription, cheaper than gin because it was taxed as a medicine and not as drink; mothers quieted infants with Godfrey’s Cordial, laudanum in a sweet syrup, and opium was used most widely of all in the undrained and malarial Fens.

## Sources

- Sydenham, T., *Observationes medicae* and later works.
- De Quincey, T. (1821). *Confessions of an English Opium-Eater*.
- Berridge, V. (1999). *Opium and the People*. London: Free Association Books.
- Wikipedia contributors. “Laudanum.” *Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia*. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laudanum (read 2 October 2026).
- Wikipedia contributors. “Godfrey’s Cordial.” *Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia*. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godfrey%27s_Cordial (read 2 October 2026).
- ANI Pharmaceuticals (current label). *Opium Tincture USP (Deodorized)*, prescribing information. DailyMed, U.S. National Library of Medicine, setid 674a969a-707d-41a9-b7c3-b90cbf2909e3.
- Langenfeld, S., et al. (2005). Therapy of the neonatal abstinence syndrome with tincture of opium or morphine drops. *Drug and Alcohol Dependence* 77: 31–36.
- Ferner, R. E., & Aronson, J. K. (2023). Medicines legislation and regulation in the United Kingdom 1500–2020. *British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology*. doi:10.1111/bcp.15497
- Plant, M. (1999). Review of V. Berridge, *Opium and the People* (Free Association Books, 1999). *BMJ* 319: 131.
- Hunter, E. K. (2022). ‘To cause sleepe safe and shure’: dangerous substances, sleep medicine and poison theories in early modern England. *Social History of Medicine* 35: 473–493.
- Berridge, V. (1999). *Opium and the People*.

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*Laudanum.* In *Materia Medica*, edited by B. C. P. Statema. Version 1, revised 2026-10-03. The Thinking Press. https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/laudanum

Historical description, not medical advice.