Salicylic acid the product with sulfuric acid gives salicylic acid: It can also be prepared by the hydrolysis of aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid) or methyl salicylate (oil of wintergreen) with a strong acid or base. Hippocrates, Galen, Pliny the Elder and others knew that willow bark could ease pain and reduce fevers. It was used in Europe and China to treat these conditions. This remedy is mentioned in texts from ancient Egypt, Sumer and Assyria. The Cherokee and other Native Americans used an infusion of the bark for fever and other medicinal purposes. In 2014, archaeologists identified traces of salicylic acid on 7th
History of aspirin preparations became a standard part of the "materia medica" of Western medicine beginning at least with the Greek physician Hippocrates in the fifth century BCE; he recommended chewing on willow bark to relieve pain or fever, and drinking tea made from it to relieve pain during childbirth. The Roman encyclopedist Celsus, in his "De Medicina" of ca. 30 AD, suggested willow leaf extract to treat the four signs of inflammation: redness, heat, swelling and pain. Willow treatments also appeared in Dioscorides's "De Materia Medica", and Pliny the Elder's "Natural History". By the time of Galen, willow bark was commonly used