Conium maculatum 399 BC, and his trial resulted in a death sentence. Although Socrates could have avoided death, he decided to take a potent infusion of the hemlock plant. Plato described Socrates' death in the "Phaedo": Although many have questioned whether this is a factual account, it is the perspective of Bloch that careful attention to Plato's words, modern and ancient medicine and other ancient Greek sources point to this account being consistent with "Conium" poisoning. Conium maculatum Conium maculatum, the hemlock or poison hemlock, is a highly poisonous biennial herbaceous flowering plant in the carrot family Apiaceae, native to Europe and
History of poison as several of its surrounding islands. The juice or liquid extracts are smeared on the head of the arrow, and inflicts the target paralysis, convulsions and/or cardiac arrest, virtually on strike due to the speed in which the extracts can affect a victim. As well as plant based poisons, there are others that are made that are based on animals. For example, the larva or pupae of a beetle genus of the Northern Kalahari Desert is used to create a slow-acting poison that can be quite useful when hunting. The beetle itself is applied to the arrow head, by squeezing