This pigment was known at a very early period, and employed by the Asiatic ladies in painting their eyelashes, or rather the insides of their eyelashes, black. Thus it is said of Jezebel, that when Jehu came to Jezreel she painted her face. The original is, _she put her eyes in sulphuret of antimony_.[65] A similar expression occurs in Ezekiel, “For whom thou didst wash thyself, paintedst thy eyes”--literally, put thy eyes in sulphuret of antimony.[66] This custom of painting the eyes black with antimony was transferred from Asia to Greece, and while the Moors occupied Spain it was employed by the Spanish ladies also. It is curious that the term _alcohol_, at present confined to _spirit of wine_, was originally applied to the powder of sulphuret of antimony.[67] The ancients were in the habit of roasting sulphuret of antimony, and thus converting it into an impure oxide. This preparation was also called stimmi and stibium. It was employed in medicine as an external application, and was conceived to act chiefly as an astringent; Dioscorides describes the method of preparing it. We see, from Pliny’s account of stibium, that he did not distinguish between sulphuret of antimony and oxide of antimony.[68] [65] 2 Kings ix. 30. [66] Chap. 23. v. 40, the Vulgate has it εστιβιζω τους οφθαλμους σουo. [67] Hartmanni Praxis Chemiatrica, p. 598. [68] Plinii Hist. Nat. xxxiii. 6. 9. Some of the compounds of arsenic were also known to the ancients; though they were neither acquainted with this substance in the metallic state, nor with its oxide; the nature of which is so violent that had it been known to them it could not have been omitted by Dioscorides and Pliny. The word σανδαραχη (_sandarache_) occurs in Aristotle, and the term αρῥενιχον (_arrhenichon_) in Theophrastus.[69] Dioscorides uses likewise the same name with Aristotle. It was applied to a scarlet-coloured mineral, which occurs native, and is now known by the name of _realgar_. It is a compound of arsenic and sulphur. It was employed in medicine both externally and internally, and is recommended by Dioscorides, as an excellent remedy for an inveterate cough. [69] Περι των λιθων, c. 71. _Auripigmentum_ and _arsenicum_ were names given to the native yellow sulphuret of arsenic. It was used in the same way, and considered by Dioscorides and Pliny as of the same nature with realgar. But there is no reason for supposing that the ancients were acquainted with the compositions of either of these bodies; far less that they had any suspicion of the existence of the metal to which we at present give the name of arsenic.