Editing Opium (section)

=== Islamic societies (500–1500 CE) ===
[[File:COLLECTIE TROPENMUSEUM Een opium kit op Java. TMnr 60009390.jpg|thumb|left|Opium users in [[Java]] during the [[Dutch East Indies|Dutch colonial period]], {{circa|1870}}]]
As the power of the [[Roman Empire]] declined, the lands to the south and east of the Mediterranean Sea became incorporated into the [[Islamic Empire]]s. Some Muslims believe ''[[hadith]]s'', such as in ''[[Sahih Bukhari]]'', prohibit every intoxicating substance, though the use of intoxicants in medicine has been widely permitted by scholars.<ref name=Syed>{{cite web|title=Alcohol and Islam|author=Ibrahim B. Syed |author-link=Ibrahim B. Syed |url=http://www.irfi.org/articles/articles_101_150/alcohol_and_islam.htm |access-date=July 7, 2005}}</ref> [[Pedanius Dioscorides|Dioscorides']] five-volume ''[[De Materia Medica]]'', the precursor of [[pharmacopoeia]]s, remained in use (which was edited and improved in the Arabic versions<ref>{{cite web|title=Islamic Medical Manuscripts at the National Library of Medicine: a note on pharmaceutics|url=https://www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/arabic/pharmaceutics1.html|access-date=June 6, 2007}}</ref>) from the 1st to 16th centuries, and described opium and the wide range of its uses prevalent in the ancient world.<ref name=Berendes>{{cite web|title=De Materia Medica|language=de|author=Julius Berendes|year=1902|url=http://www.tiscalinet.ch/materiamedica/Mohn.htm|access-date=May 10, 2007 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070208230539/http://www.tiscalinet.ch/materiamedica/Mohn.htm |archive-date = February 8, 2007}}</ref>

[[File:Опиумоеды.jpg|thumb|''Opium-eaters'' by [[Vasily Vereshchagin]] depicts an opium den in [[Turkestan]], 1868]]
Between 400 and 1200 AD, Arab traders introduced opium to China, and to India by 700 AD.<ref name=drugs/><ref name="Schiff" /><ref name="Frontline" /><ref name="Trocki" /> The physician [[Muhammad ibn Zakariya al-Razi]] of [[Persian people|Persian]] origin ("Rhazes", 845–930 CE) maintained a laboratory and school in [[Baghdad]], and was a student and critic of [[Galen]]; he made use of opium in anesthesia and recommended its use for the treatment of melancholy in ''Fi ma-la-yahdara al-tabib'', "In the Absence of a Physician", a home medical manual directed toward ordinary citizens for self-treatment if a doctor was not available.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.answers.com/topic/al-razi|title=Answers.com: al-Razi|website=[[Answers.com]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Razi.html|date=January 2002|title=Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn Zakariya al-Razi (841–926)|newspaper=Saudi Aramco World|access-date=January 12, 2008}}</ref>

The renowned [[Al-Andalus|Andalusian]] [[ophthalmology|ophthalmologic]] surgeon [[Abu al-Qasim al-Zahrawi]] ("Abulcasis", 936–1013 CE) relied on opium and [[Mandragora officinarum|mandrake]] as surgical anesthetics and wrote a treatise, ''[[al-Tasrif]]'', that influenced medical thought well into the 16th century.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ummah.com/science/viewscfeature1.php?scfid=36&scTopicID=6|title=El Zahrawi – Father Of Surgery|access-date=May 4, 2007|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070927013042/http://www.ummah.com/science/viewscfeature1.php?scfid=36&scTopicID=6|archive-date=September 27, 2007|df=mdy-all}}</ref>

The Persian physician [[Avicenna|Abū 'Alī al-Husayn ibn Sina]] ("Avicenna") described opium as the most powerful of the stupefacients, in comparison to mandrake and other highly effective herbs, in ''[[The Canon of Medicine]]''. The text lists medicinal effects of opium, such as analgesia, hypnosis, antitussive effects, gastrointestinal effects, cognitive effects, respiratory depression, neuromuscular disturbances, and sexual dysfunction. It also refers to opium's potential as a poison. Avicenna describes several methods of delivery and recommendations for doses of the drug.<ref name=Heydari>{{cite journal|title=Medicinal aspects of opium as described in Avicenna's Canon of Medicine|journal=Acta medico-historica Adriatica |date=2013 |pmid=23883087 |volume=11 |issue=1 |pages=101–12 |last1=Heydari |first1=M|last2=Hashempur|first2=M. H.|last3=Zargaran|first3=A}}</ref> This classic text was translated into Latin in 1175 and later into many other languages and remained authoritative until the 19th century.<ref name=Smith>{{cite journal |author=Smith RD |title=Avicenna and the Canon of Medicine: a millennial tribute |journal=The Western Journal of Medicine |volume=133 |issue=4 |pages=367–70 |date=October 1980 |pmid=7051568 |pmc=1272342 }}</ref> [[Şerafeddin Sabuncuoğlu]] used opium in the 14th-century Ottoman Empire to treat [[migraine]] headaches, [[sciatica]], and other painful ailments.<ref name=Ganidagli>{{cite journal |last1=Ganidagli |first1=Suleyman |last2=Cengiz |first2=Mustafa |last3=Aksoy |first3=Sahin |last4=Verit |first4=Ayhan |title=Approach to painful disorders by Şerefeddin Sabuncuoğlu in the fifteenth century Ottoman period. |journal=Anesthesiology |date=January 2004 |volume=100 |issue=1 |pages=165–9 |doi=10.1097/00000542-200401000-00026 |pmid=14695738 |url=https://pubs.asahq.org/anesthesiology/article/100/1/165/173/Approach-to-Painful-Disorders-by-Serefeddin |access-date=31 May 2022 |issn=1528-1175|s2cid=27900838}}</ref>