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Donkey milk knowledge archive · Historical source
Ibn al-Baitar (c. 1240): donkey milk in the great Arabic book of medicines and foods
The pharmacologist Ibn al-Baitar, who died in Damascus in 1248, collected in his great lexicon of simple medicines and foods what Greek and Arabic physicians had written about donkey milk. One source even advises feeding the jennies in a particular way for ten days before milking.
- Author
- Ibn al-Baitar (Abdallah ibn Ahmad, c. 1197–1248); translated by Joseph von Sontheimer (1788–1854)
- Work
- Kitab al-Jami li-mufradat al-adwiya wa-l-aghdhiya; German “Große Zusammenstellung über die Kräfte der bekannten einfachen Heil- und Nahrungsmittel”, vol. 2, Stuttgart 1842
- Passage
- Letter L, article “Milk” (Arabic laban), section on the kinds of milk, pp. 423–424 of the translation
- Time & place
- c. 1240 (original); German translation 1842 · Damascus (original); Stuttgart (translation)
- Type of source
- Lexicon of medicines and foods (compilation)
In the original words
What the original says
Die Eselsmilch ist bei der Schwerathmigkeit, bei Entzündungen, beim Husten und bei Zittern des Herzens von Nuzen.
Donkey milk is [according to the author “Eljahudi” quoted by Ibn al-Baitar] useful in shortness of breath, inflammations, coughs and palpitations of the heart.
Man muss, bevor man die Eselsmilch trinkt, diese Thiere zehn Tage lang mit Aegle Marmelos, Cichorie, Stroh, Kleien mit in Wasser geweichter Gerste, mit Portulak und mit Salat und Heu füttern
Before drinking donkey milk, one should [according to the quoted Honain] feed the animals for ten days on bael (Sontheimer’s identification), chicory, straw, bran with barley soaked in water, purslane, lettuce and hay.
Statt der Eselsmilch, wenn sie nicht zu haben ist, wendet man die Ziegenmilch an.
If no donkey milk is to be had, goat’s milk is used instead [according to the quoted “Elsahir”].
English rendering: our own translation by the DON DONKEY’S editorial team, following the sense of the text.
A look at the original
What the passage looks like
Page 424 of volume 2 of Joseph von Sontheimer’s German translation (Stuttgart 1842): quotations from Arabic physicians on donkey milk in the article “Milk”.
The page comes from a freely accessible digitised copy. Click to open the passage at the library.
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek München, Digitalisat via Internet Archive; gemeinfrei
Background
Who, when, what kind of text
Ibn al-Baitar came from Málaga in al-Andalus, travelled through North Africa and the Near East and worked last in Cairo and Damascus, where he died in 1248. His main work arranges well over a thousand medicines and foods alphabetically and, under each heading, assembles verbatim excerpts from older authors, from Dioscorides and Galen to Rhazes, Ibn Sina and less famous Arabic physicians.
The only complete German translation was published in 1840–1842 by Joseph von Sontheimer, surgeon general of the Württemberg army. It makes the work accessible without Arabic, but it is not free of errors; names of authors and plants are often only transliterated or uncertainly identified. Lucien Leclerc published a newer French translation in 1877–1883. We quote Sontheimer’s text and mark it as a translation.
Content
What the source reports about donkey milk
In the article “Milk”, Ibn al-Baitar goes through the kinds of milk one after another. For donkey milk he first takes over Galen: it is among the thinnest milks, contains more watery matter than goat’s milk and is given to fever patients. Dioscorides is quoted with the advice to rinse the mouth with it to strengthen the gums and teeth.
On page 424 Arabic voices follow. An author rendered as “Eljahudi” names shortness of breath, coughs, chest complaints and ulcers of the bladder, with a daily amount of about three ounces in the morning. “Elthabari” recommends it for poisoning and dysentery. The physician quoted as “Honain”, probably Hunayn ibn Ishaq (9th century), describes in detail what the jennies should be fed for ten days before the cure, differently for each illness.
Finally the text states briefly that goat’s milk is used when no donkey milk is to be had. The passage shows that Arabic medicine treated donkey milk as a distinct kind of milk, used above all for chest complaints and fevers.
At a glance
Figures & facts from the source
Timeline
Where this source stands in the history of donkey milk
Each dot is a source from our knowledge archive – from Greek antiquity to the present day.
Critical assessment
How reliable is this source?
Source value
Ibn al-Baitar’s lexicon is a collection of quotations and therefore a window onto many older texts, some of them lost. The linked German translation of 1842 can be checked page by page as a scan; it is, however, a translation whose identifications of names and plants must be read with care.
Many voices, no verdict of his own
The statements on donkey milk do not come from Ibn al-Baitar himself but from the authors he quotes. Some of them, such as the one rendered as “Eljahudi”, cannot be identified with certainty without the Arabic original.
Today’s assessment
The uses mentioned reflect the humoral medicine of the Middle Ages and are not health claims valid today. What remains interesting is the practical idea that the animals’ feed and keeping influence the milk.
Our assessment
The passage links the Greek tradition with Arabic medicine and shows how naturally donkey milk was treated there as a kind of milk in its own right. Particularly striking is the advice to feed the jennies in a targeted way before the cure.
References
Sources to check
- Primary sourceEbn Baithar, Große Zusammenstellung über die Kräfte der bekannten einfachen Heil- und Nahrungsmittel, translated from Arabic by Joseph von Sontheimer, vol. 2, Stuttgart: Hallberger 1842, p. 424 (Bavarian State Library scan on the Internet Archive)
https://archive.org/details/10219077bsb/page/n431/mode/1up - SupplementaryPreceding page 423 of the same article: here Ibn al-Baitar quotes Galen on thin, watery donkey milk for fever patients and Dioscorides on rinsing the mouth
https://archive.org/details/10219077bsb/page/n430/mode/1up
More sources and studies in the research archive. Summarised by the DON DONKEY’S editorial team, as of November 2026.