“ The fruits, the so-called seeds, which constitute the cumin of pharmacy, are fusiform or ovoid in shape and compressed laterally; they are two lines long, are hotter to the taste, lighter in colour, and larger than caraway seeds, and have on each half nine fine ridges, overlying as many oil-channels or vittae. Their strong aromatic smell and warm bitterish taste are due to the presence of about 3% of an essential oil. The tissue of the seeds contains a fatty oil, with resin, mucilage and gum, malates and albuminous matter ”

“ It was found to occasion pallor of the face, whence the expression of Horace, exsangue cuminum (Epist. i. 19) , and that of Persius, pallentis grana cumini (Sat. v. 55) . Pliny relates the story that it was employed by the followers of Porcius Latro, the celebrated rhetorician, in order to produce a complexion such as bespeaks application to study (xx. 57) . ”