A chemical analysis of 20th century traditional medicines curated at the Ditsong museum of culture History, Pretoria, South Africa

This paper presents the results of chemical tests conducted on the contents of seven 20th Century medicine containers, mostly from southern Africa, curated at the Ditsong Museum of Culture History. Our results reveal 56 discreet chemical compounds, most of which are plant secondary metabolites but including several toxins and a synthetic compound. A range of different ingredients, some of which could be from plant or animal origin, are implicated in each of the containers. Although most of the identified compounds have known medicinal and/or nutritional properties, some, like conhydrine, are toxic to humans, while others, like 1-naphtol, are synthetic and must indicate contamination, probably introduced during a preparatory stage of manufacture. We contextualise the results in reference to current knowledge of traditional African pharmacopeia and Materia Medica, which is intimately articulated within local cultures, customs and world views. Our study provides some new knowledge of the chemical constituents and possible preparatory contamination of traditional medicines during the 20th Century.