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Duration:	10:08
Uploaded:	2025-10-20
Last sync:	2025-10-20 16:15

Ancient texts described silphium as a remedy for everything from tetanus to tooth ache, and a delicacy – it could do it all and was prized around the Mediterranean world. But by the end of the first century CE, it was gone. This plant has the dubious honor of being the first extinction in recorded history… or does it?



Endlings portrait illustrations are by Zoe Keller. You can find out more about her and her work here: https://www.zoekeller.com/



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Sources:

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Laserpitium#

https://www.collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/english/cyrenaica

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.02.0137%3Abook%3D19%3Achapter%3D15

https://www.kew.org/read-and-watch/silphium-mystery

https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/conservation-science/articles/10.3389/fcosc.2021.785962/full

https://www.mdpi.com/2223-7747/10/1/102

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/premium/article/miracle-plant-eaten-extinction-2000-years-ago-silphion

https://www.worldhistory.org/article/2252/theophrastus-and-pliny-the-elder-on-silphium/

https://www.mdpi.com/2571-9408/5/2/51

https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/C_EH-p697-3-Cyr

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/thapsia

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Tingis#:~:text=(Classical%20Latin)%20IPA:%20%5B,IPA:%20%5B%CB%88t%CC%AAin%CC%A0%CA%B2.d%CD%A1%CA%92is%5D

https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/agricultural-and-biological-sciences/asafoetida

https://www.collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/english/cyrene

https://www.britannica.com/science/desertification

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Great-Chain-of-Being

https://www.intechopen.com/chapters/82253

https://evolution.berkeley.edu/the-history-of-evolutionary-thought/1800s/extinctions-georges-cuvier/

https://embryo.asu.edu/pages/georges-cuvier-1769-1832

https://www.uky.edu/KGS/education/did-big-bone-lick-georges-cuvier.php

https://www.vox.com/2015/4/13/8384167/thomas-jefferson-mastodons

https://lewis-clark.org/sciences/geology/paleontology/mastodons/

https://www.monticello.org/research-education/thomas-jefferson-encyclopedia/species-extinction/

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ferula_distribution_map.svg

https://www.gbif.org/species/8048981

https://www.gbif.org/species/3636208

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Images:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LYq45ROw0ooRJtzB5xhWM14psRKycJrjIMGhW8soiWY/edit?tab=t.0