MacGyvering medieval poison
Does anyone know of any compound/substance one could have access to in a stone prison cell (From food? The rocks? The metal bars?) that could be processed through rudimentary means into a quick acting poison/venom?
Prerequisites:
- That it can quickly (within the hour) start showing effects (whether ingested or applied into a wound).
- Can't be made through means unavailable to an ordinary person inside a prison cell.
- It can be something that doesn't cause death but instead leaves the person heavily impaired (Paralysis, loss of consciousness, stroke-like symptoms...).
- Time is not a problem, production can take up to a month, and it only needs to be a single dose.
- It has to be a small dose.
- Can be extracted from food, but can't come from "specific herbs", the character is imprisoned and as such can't go out to look for specific plants/minerals.
In the story I'm writing, the protagonist finds themselves locked up and enslaved in a medieval prison/castle. Though there is magic in the setting it is not available to him.
My current idea was that he gathers apple/apricot seeds and crush them to make a cyanide-based poison, but by the looks of it there's no way to make it concentrated enough for it to be a relatively small dose.
This post was sourced from https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/q/141899. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
1 answer
St. Anthony's Fire
A fungus also known as ergot, found on rye grains and in rye bread containing a natural LSD substance.
The convulsive symptoms from ergot-tainted rye may have been the source of accusations of bewitchment that spurred the Salem witch trials.
Thought to have inspired the Triptych of the Temptation of St. Anthony, this is the detail of Saint Anthony being carried into the sky by demons:
Hieronymus Bosch - Wikipedia 2019, CCASA Licence.
characterized by muscle spasms, fever and hallucinations and the victims may appear dazed, be unable to speak, become manic, or have other forms of paralysis or tremors, and suffer from hallucinations and other distorted perceptions.... violent burning, peripheral pulses and shooting pain of the poorly vascularized distal organs, such as the fingers and toes...
If the poisoning continues long term then gangrene of the limbs and death will result.
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