Spanish fly

Spanish Fly
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Order:	Coleoptera
Family:	Meloidae
Subfamily:	Meloinae
Tribe:	Lyttini
Genus:	Lytta
Species:	L. vesicatoria
Binomial name
Lytta vesicatoria (Linnaeus, 1758)

The Spanish fly is an emerald-green beetle in the family Meloidae, Lytta vesicatoria.^[1] Other species of blister beetle used by apothecaries are often called by the same name. Lytta vesicatoria is sometimes incorrectly called Cantharis vesicatoria, but the genus Cantharis is in an unrelated family, Cantharidae.^[2]

Cantharidin (etymology: Greek kantharis, beetle) is a powerful irritant vesicant (blister-inducing) substance obtained from many blister beetles, and sometimes given the nickname "Spanish fly." Cantharidin is claimed to have aphrodisiac properties, as a result of its irritant effects upon the body's genitourinary tract, and can result in poisoning if ingested.^[3] Ingestion of blister beetles from infested hay causes similar serious toxic symptoms in animals.^[4]

The beetle

Lytta vesicatoria is 15 millimetres (0.59 in) to 22 millimetres (0.87 in) long and 5 millimetres (0.20 in) to 8 millimetres (0.31 in) wide. Adult beetles feed on leaves of ash, lilac, amur privet and white willow trees; larvae are parasitic on the brood of ground nesting bees. The beetle lives in scrublands and woods throughout southern Europe and eastward to Central Asia and Siberia.^[5]

Cantharidin

Cantharidin, the principal irritant in Spanish fly, was first isolated and named in 1810 by Pierre Robiquet, a French chemist then living in Paris, from Lytta vesicatoria. Robiquet demonstrated that cantharidin was the actual principle responsible for the aggressively blistering properties of the coating of the eggs of that insect, and established that cantharidin had very definite toxic and poisonous properties comparable in degree to that of the most violent poisons known in the 19th century, such as strychnine.^[6]

Cantharidin, a terpenoid, is produced by various insect species. The body of the beetle contains up to 5% cantharidin. The crushed powder is of yellowish brown to brown-olive color with iridescent reflections, of disagreeable scent and bitter flavor.

Uses

The potency of the insect species has been known since antiquity and used in various ways, in particular prepared and sold in powdered form obtained from dried and ground beetles, known as cantharides (the Greek plural form of the singular cantharis).

Aphrodisiac

Collecting cantharides, 19th century.

As it passes through the body, cantharidin irritates the genitals resulting in increased blood flow that can mimic the engorgement that occurs with sexual excitement.^[3] For this reason, various preparations of desiccated Spanish flies have been used as some of the world's oldest alleged aphrodisiacs, with a reputation dating back to the early western Mediterranean classical civilizations. The ease of toxic overdose makes this highly dangerous, and for this reason the sale of such products as Spanish Fly has been made illegal in most countries. Nevertheless, there are many historical examples:

• In Roman times, Livia, the scheming wife of Augustus Caesar, slipped it into food hoping to inspire her guests to some indiscretion with which she could later blackmail them.^[7]
• Henry IV (1050–1106) is known to have consumed Spanish fly at the risk of his health.^{[citation needed]}
• In 1572, Ambroise Paré wrote an account of a man suffering from "the most frightful satyriasis" after taking a potion composed of nettles and cantharides.^[8]
• In the 1670s, Spanish fly was mixed with dried moles and bat's blood for a love charm made by the magician La Voisin.^[9]
• It was slipped into the food of Louis XIV to secure the king's lust for Madame de Montespan.
• In the 18th century, cantharides became fashionable, known as pastilles Richelieu in France.
• It is claimed the Marquis de Sade gave aniseed-flavored pastilles that were laced with Spanish fly to prostitutes at an orgy in 1772. He was sentenced to death for poisoning and sodomy, but later reprieved on appeal.^[10]

Medical uses

Medical use dates back to descriptions from Hippocrates. Plasters made from wings of these beetles have been used to raise blisters. Cantharides was used as an abortifacient,^[11] a stimulant (since one of its effects was producing insomnia and nervous agitation), and as a poison. Cantharidin is used today as a topical application for treatment of benign epithelial growths including most warts.^[12]

It has been suggested that Simón Bolívar may have been accidentally poisoned by the application of spanish fly.^[13]

Poison

In powder, mixed with the food, cantharides could go unnoticed and has thus been employed as a poison: Aqua toffana, or aquetta di Napoli, was one of the poisons associated with the Medicis. Thought to be a mixture of arsenic and cantharides, this was reportedly created by an Italian countess, Toffana. Four to six drops of this poison in water or wine was enough to deliver death in a few hours.^[14] Symptoms of cantharidin poisoning including burning of the mouth, dysphagia, nausea, hematemesis, gross hematuria, and dysuria.^[3]

In order to determine if a death had taken place by the effects of Spanish fly, investigators resorted to the vesicación test. One of those test methods consisted of rubbing part of the internal organs of the deceased, dissolved in oil, on the shaved skin of a rabbit; the absorption of the cantharides and its blistering effect are such that they became visible on the skin of the rabbit.

Lytta vesicatoria (Blister beetle)

Culinary uses

Dawamesk, a spread or jam made in North Africa and containing hashish, almond paste, pistachio nuts, sugar, orange or tamarind peel, cloves and other various spices, occasionally included cantharides.

In Morocco and other parts of North Africa, spice blends known as ras el hanout sometimes included cantharides as an ingredient. However, the sale of cantharides in Moroccan spice markets was banned in the 1990s.^[15]

Other uses

In ancient China, the beetles were mixed with human excrement, arsenic and wolfsbane to make the world's first recorded stink bomb.^[16]

In Santería, cantharides are used in incense.^[17]

Notes

References

Wikispecies has information related to: Spanish fly

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• Booth, Martin (2004). Cannabis: A History. Picador. ISBN 0-312-42494-9. 
• Cavendish, Richard (1968). The Black Arts: An Absorbing Account of Witchcraft, Demonology, Astrology, and Other Mystical Practices Throughout the Ages. Perigee Trade. ISBN 0-399-50035-9. 
• Davidson, Alan (1999). The Oxford Companion to Food. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-211579-0. 
• Gonzalez-Wippler, Migene (2002). Santería: The Religion. Llewellyn Publications. ISBN 1-56718-329-8. 
• Milsten, Richard (2000). The Sexual Male: Problems and Solutions. W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 0-393-32127-4. 
• Reichl, Ruth, ed. (2004). The Gourmet Cookbook. Houghton Mifflin. ISBN 0-618-37408-6. 
• Stevens, Serita Deborah (1990). Deadly Doses: A Writer's Guide to Poisons. Writer's Digest Books. ISBN 0-89879-371-8. 
• Theroux, Paul (1989). Riding the Iron Rooster. Ivy Books. ISBN 0-8041-0454-9.