the highly poisonous seed of a tropical African woody vine (Physostigma venenosum) used to produce contraction of the pupil of the eye and in tetanus and strychnine poisoning. It is the common ordeal bean employed by the natives in trials for witchcraft.
Calabar Bean is the seed of the plant Physostigma venenosum, which is indigenous to Western Africa but now cultivated in India and parts of South America. It was used primarily in traditional herbal medicine as eye drops for eye diseases & glaucoma.
Classic herbal references note that Calabar bean's chief use was in eye diseases as a local myotic (producing contraction of pupil of the eye). Interestingly, Calabar bean's main alkaloid, physostigmine was later synthesized and used in the treatment of glaucoma. Common names: Chop Nut, Ordeal Bean.
