Из Едема выходила река для орошения рая;
и потом разделялась на четыре реки. Имя одной Фисон (Пишон): она обтекает
всю землю Хавила, ту, где золото;
и золото той земли хорошее; там бдолах и камень оникс

в этот зимний день я расскажу сказку про фаянс !
что же такое этот фаянс 
какой же он истинный фаянс какими медицинскими свойствами он обладает
и кому от нас за него поклон... главврачу древнего египта
личному врачу фараона  Djoser
гастроэнтерологу  Hesy-Ra  (посвещается ....)

HISTORY OF MEDICINE
The ancient use of faïence in paediatric illness

We examine the treatment of urinary incontinence in Ancient Egypt
with faïence in the light of current concerns regarding the treatment
of dysfunctional elimination in children with milk of magnesia.
The  origins  of  medical  science  in  Africa  and  their  influence  on
Western  medicine  are  attested  to  by  surviving  documents  from  the
XVIII  Dynasty  of  the  New  Kingdom  period  of  Pharaonic  Egypt.
One such document is the Ebers Papyrus, an ancient medical treatise
containing 108 columns of text, that represents the then current and
ancient  medical  knowledge  in  Egypt  from  about  1536  BC,  during
the  reign  of  Amenhotep  I.  Its  translation1  provides  insight  into  the
art and science of the early practice of historical medicine – some of
which still applies to modern medical practice.
One ancient practice of interest to the modern practising physician
can  be  found  in  Rubric  #273  (Column  49,  Line  21)  of  the  Ebers
Papyrus,  that  involves  the  treatment  of  bed-wetting  or  urinary
incontinence in a child. ‘Do this for a child suffering from bed-wetting:
Boil faïence beads until they form a pellet; if he be an older child, he
should  swallow  it  in  a  gulp,  [but]  if  he  be  in  swaddling  clothes,  one
should rub [it] together for him in the milk, just as it flows forth from
his nurse for four days.’2
Ancient Egyptian faïence (or tjehnet) was one of the first artificial
substances created by man (Figs 1 and 2). Used mainly as jewellery,
this by-product of bronze-age technology was first made about 5 500
years  ago.  Faïence  items  are  symbolic  of  life  and  rebirth,  and  many
beautiful examples have been found in burial chambers dating back
to  the  pre-dynastic  age  of  Pharaonic  Egypt.3  Faïence  is  a  non-clay
ceramic  material  that  has  a  vitrified  glaze  of  various  colors,  usually
blue and green. It is not pottery or glass. The most common faïence
beads were made of steatite, or soapstone, that was heated. Steatite is
a  soft  metamorphic  mineral  made  of  talc  and  magnesium,  and  it  is
the magnesium released from the faïence on boiling that provides its
medicinal value.
Fig. 1. Imhotep’s faïence tile mosaic was discovered in the Step Pyramid at
Saggara, the tomb of Djoser. Djoser is also called by his Horus name, Netjer-ikhet, ‘the divine of body’. Djoser was the 2nd Pharaoh of the 3rd dynasty of
the Old Kingdom of Egypt, and  ruled circa 2668 - 2649 BC. The chief physi-cian of Egypt at the time and personal physician of Djoser was Hesy-Ra, a
gastro-enterologist of his day, who would have used faïence as described in
the  Ebers  Papyrus.  The  invention  of  soapstone  tile  faïence  is  attributed  to
Imhotep,  the  great  sage,  architect  and  physician  of  Egypt.  He  incorporated
36  000  such  faïence  tiles  in  the  decoration  of  the  tomb,  arranging  them  in
a pattern similar to the faïence beads found in Egyptian jewellery placed in
pre-dynastic burials. Examples of these tiles are housed at the British Mu-seum in Room 64: Early Egypt (EA66830)

Сосуд из сердолика наполнил медом,
Сосуд из лазури наполнил маслом,