Snail
Limax, cochlea; snail water
- Known today as
- Garden snails, shelled and boiled, distilled, or eaten.
- Kind
- Animal, in 1 older authority
- Constituents
- mucin glycoproteins, allantoin, glycolic acid, and 1 more
- Earliest authority here
- Pliny (AD 23/24–79)
Revised October 3, 2026: Lore added from texts read in full. Checked against its sources, each read in full, in part, or in its abstract. Version 1, first published September 30, 2026.
Snail: what was it used for?
Snail water, aqua limacum, stood in the London Dispensatory of 1653 to purge the lungs of phlegm and help consumptions; snails applied outwardly, Culpeper says, helped the gout, drew thorns out of the flesh, and stopped bleeding at the nose.
Snail: what does modern science say?
Snail mucus has returned in skin creams, though clinical randomized trials of its safety and efficacy are still lacking.
Pharmacognosy & Toxicology
- Constituents
- mucin glycoproteinsthe slime
- allantoin ChEMBL
- glycolic acid ChEMBL
- haemocyaninthe oxygen-carrying blood protein of gastropods, as in the keyhole limpet
- Mechanism
- Culpeper reasoned that snails cured consumption because man, made of the slime of the earth, is restored by their slime, and warned against purging it away; snail mucin in cosmetics has small trials for wound healing and photoaged skin; and the haemocyanin of the giant keyhole limpet, another gastropod, is used as a carrier protein to raise antibodies in research and therapy.
- Toxic dose
- Raw or undercooked snails can carry rat lungworm, the commonest cause of eosinophilic meningitis in Southeast Asia and the Pacific.
- Standing
- Snail mucin is a cosmetic ingredient; snail water is in the history books.
- Gentilcore, D. (2016). Food and Health in Early Modern Europe. Bloomsbury. Verified against its record · doi:10.5040/9781474219563
- Fabi, S. G., et al. (2013). “The effects of filtrate of the secretion of the Cryptomphalus aspersa on photoaged skin.” Journal of Drugs in Dermatology 12. 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.
Snail: what lore surrounds it?
In Thiselton-Dyer's wart-cures the snail is the northern one: “in the North, one has but to hang a snail on a thorn, and as the poor creature wastes away the warts will disappear.”
Snail: what did the older authorities say?
- Pliny
- Calls a diet of snails, simmered and then grilled and eaten with wine and garum, one of the very best remedies for the stomach; bruised in water they are good for spitting of blood, and beaten up raw in warm water they allay a cough.
Sources
- Pliny the Elder, Natural History. Read in part · the text read
- Thiselton-Dyer, T. F. (1889). The Folk-lore of Plants. Project Gutenberg #10118. Read in part · the text read
- Culpeper, N. (1653). Pharmacopœia Londinensis, or, The London Dispensatory. London: Peter Cole. Text Creation Partnership edition A35381. Read in part · the text read
- Hudz, N., et al. (2025). Chemical variability and biological potential of Cornu aspersum mucus as a source for the development of new cosmetic and pharmaceutical products. Molecules 30. Read in full · the text read
- Wikipedia, “Snail slime.” Read in full · the text read
- Wikipedia, “Keyhole limpet hemocyanin.” Read in full · the text read
- Wikipedia, “Angiostrongylus cantonensis.” 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
- Each quotation from the older authorities checked word for word against the text, read in full
- Every source read, in full, in part, or in its abstract, and every sentence checked against what was read (October 3, 2026)
- Sources
- 9 cited: 4 read in full, 3 read in part, 1 abstract read, 1 verified against its record. 2 with the abstract on file.
- Corrections
- None were needed.
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 30, 2026 · last revised October 3, 2026
- Chicago
“Snail.” 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/snail.
- MLA
“Snail.” Materia Medica, edited by B. C. P. Statema, version 1, The Thinking Press, 3 Oct. 2026, thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/snail. Accessed 8 Oct. 2026.
- APA
Snail. (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/snail
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See Also
Sharing allantoin, haemocyanin
Symphytum officinale · Pulmonaria officinalis · Cynoglossum officinale · Woodlouse
Also in Pliny the Elder
Snapdragon in Pliny the Elder · Silphium in Pliny the Elder · Sugar in Pliny the Elder · Shepherd’s purse in Pliny the Elder · everything Pliny the Elder names →
Drawing on the same sources: Thiselton-Dyer, Culpeper, Wikipedia, Gentilcore
Radish · Violet, lettuce, sow-thistle · Solomon’s seal · Sorrel, syrup of · Spermaceti · Salt · the bibliography →
Nearby in the alphabet
Silver · The sickener (brittle mushroom of wet pine woods) · Southernwood (“lad’s love) · Shiitake (cultivated in China and Japan for about a thousand years)
Historical description, not medical advice.