CIMOLIA TERRA, in Natural History, a name applied by the ancients to an earth, at one time much employed in medicine; but which later ages have supposed to be no other than our tobacco-pipe clay and fullers earth.
The cimolia terra of the ancients was found in several of the islands of the Archipelago, particularly in the island of Cimolus, from whence it has its name. It was used with great success in the erysipelas, in-
flammations, and the like, being applied by way of cataplasm to the part. They also used, as we do, what we call cimolia, or fullers earth, for the cleansing of clothes. This earth of the ancients, though so long disregarded, and by many supposed to be lost, is yet very plentiful in Argentiere (the ancient Cimolus), Sphanto, and many of those islands. It is a marl of a lax and crumbly texture, and a pure bright white colour, very soft to the touch. It adheres firmly to the tongue, and, if thrown into water, raises a little hissing and ebullition, and moulders to a fine powder. It makes a considerable effervescence with acids, and suffers no change of colour in the fire. These are the characters of what the ancients called simply terra cimolia; but besides this, they had from the same place another earth which they called by the same general name, but distinguished by the epithet purple, purpurescens. This they described to be fattish, cold to the touch, of a mixed purple colour, and nearly as hard as a stone. And this was evidently the substance we call steatites, or the soap-rock, common in Cornwall, and also in the island of Argentiere, or Cimolus.