The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 279 No 7463 p128
4 August 2007

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On the trail of chickens, eggs and ducks

Victorian Age rooted in tragedy and death

As God is my witness … address unknown

Stockholm tar given all clear by Europe

On the trail of chickens, eggs and ducks

A recent report in The Times brought to mind a variation of the old “which came first, the chicken or the egg” question. Now we must ask “where first” as well.

Archaeologists in South America found some ancient chicken bones which, on analysis, proved to be genetically identical to others found on similar digs in Asia. I think we can assume the birds did not fly across the Pacific Ocean.

Most experts believe the Pacific was peopled from the east as the great Polynesian navigators moved from one island group to another until reaching a limit defined by an arc from Hawaii, through Easter Island to New Zealand. Did they also take chickens to Peru?

Sixty years ago, in the summer of 1947, a battered bundle of balsa wood logs crashed onto a coral reef. Kon-Tiki had arrived even though experts had predicted the balsa logs would quickly become waterlogged and the bindings disintegrate in salt water. However, Thor Heyerdahl and his crew sailed the raft about 4,300 miles from Callao in Peru to the tiny atoll of Raroia in Polynesia.

Heyerdahl knew that similar balsa craft had traded along the coast and out as far as the Galapagos Islands. He also knew the legends about a defeated king, Kon-Tiki, who sailed westwards away from Peru following the sun. He thought the prevailing currents and winds could favour westward travel and had recorded stories in Polynesia about a tall, white, bearded leader they called Tiki who came from the east. Did he bring the chickens?

Of course, showing a journey was possible does not mean it happened, but it does seem to demonstrate that the oceans are highways rather than barriers to exploration. Further proof comes in the shape of 29,000 yellow plastic ducks (with some blue turtles and green frogs) lost from a container ship during a storm in the eastern Pacific in 1992.

So far they have been found on beaches in Australia, South America and Hawaii. Some drifted up into the Bering Sea, were frozen into the Arctic pack ice then escaped into the Atlantic Ocean. After drifting 17,000 miles the wind and currents will bring them to the beaches of the south-west of England, probably Cornwall, later this summer.

Beachcombers should look out for yellow ducks stamped with “The First Years” for proof of the way our ocean environments interconnect.

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Victorian Age rooted in tragedy and death

Two hundred years ago the physician Sir Richard Croft, 6th Bt, whose family is associated with Croft Castle in the quiet, lush landscape of North Herefordshire, joined and then inherited his father-in-law's fashionable London medical practice. While I was browsing wistfully (yes, covetously) among some beautiful Victorian scientific instruments in a saleroom near the castle a sad tale came to mind …

Victoria came to the throne in 1837 and reigned for over 60 years but our Victorian age only happened after a tragedy in 1817 involving three deaths and a crisis in the monarchy.

Princess Charlotte was the only child of George IV and, at the time, the only legitimate grandchild of George III. In 1816 she married Prince Leopold of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, who would become the King of the Belgians, and soon became pregnant.

After an agonising labour she delivered a still-born son. Had he lived he would have been king. Sadly, following a massive haemorrhage, Charlotte died the following day.

The attending physician, the same Sir Richard Croft, blamed himself for their deaths. No one else, not even the king, held him responsible but, some months later after a similar tragedy and still overwhelmed with feelings of guilt, he committed suicide.

Neither the second nor the third sons of George III had heirs so Victoria, born in 1819 and the daughter of his fourth son Edward, came to the throne and thus we had our Victorian Age and our Victoriana to collect.

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As God is my witness … address unknown

We should not trivialise the problems caused by errors, dispensing or otherwise. However a report from Romania may be of interest.

Pavel Mircea, who is serving a prison sentence for murder, tried to sue God, citing an act of God or rather the inaction of God for the error in his ways; he also sought compensation from above.

Mircea was baptised in the Romanian Orthodox Church whereupon he believes he made a contract with God to protect him from evil and wrongdoing which He then failed to honour.

The court in Timisoara accepted the action and began proceedings but, having spent two years trying to find God’s address the prosecutors have closed the case. They decided it was unlikely that the defendant could be summoned for the hearing.

There may not be a sound legal precedent here but it might prove tempting to try it out if one has to make a record in the error log.

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Stockholm tar given all clear by Europe

Stockholm tar, also known as pine tar, tar oil and pine oil, was one of those traditional, old-fashioned lines which sat quietly in a corner of the stockroom. Occasionally sold to farmers or horse-owners it was used as an antiseptic and for hoof care on cattle, sheep and horses.

Named after the city where first manufactured it was also applied as a wood preservative and sealant in boats. That corner of the stockroom where we stored it alongside another old favourite, cade oil, was always worth a deep sniff when passing so conjuring up memories of pine forests and kippers.

The European Union Biocide Directive added Stockholm tar to the Biocide Register as the aromatic hydrocarbons, tar acids and tar bases present were considered too toxic for we mortals and our environment to handle.

Recently, however, the directive on pine tar reported that laboratory research has shown it to be less toxic than previously thought. Stockholm tar has been deleted from the Biocide Register, will continue to be available and we will be able to use it as a wood preservative.

Our Scandinavian neighbours campaigned strongly for this review as a lot of Stockholm tar is used to preserve their beautiful old wooden churches. They are pleased with the outcome, as indeed are the owners of traditional wooden boats.