Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Storm Raven" data-source="post: 2860584" data-attributes="member: 307">My understanding concerning poison use in the pre-modern world is that getting the poison itself was never really the problem (there are lots of substances quite toxic to humans that are easily found in nature). Rather, the problem was successfully delivering the toxin to the intended victim.Contact poisons are hard to make, and probably close to impossible for a preindustrial society (although magic can overcome this obstacle). Inhaled poisons are similarly difficult to craft. A poison delivered via the bloodstream would have problems as well - you have to wound the target (which eliminates the biggest selling factor for poisons: hiding the identity of the killer), and for a lot of them you have to deliver a bigger dose than could be smeared on a weapon (assuming the toxin would even "stick" if applied that way).Which leaves poisoning via food or drink as the most "reliable" method. But this has drawbacks too. You have to make sure the intended target actually gets the poisoned food, which can be tricky (and if you mess up and poison someone near them, the target is likely to become cautious in the future, making it harder to get the poison to him). Many poisons change the smell and taste of the food they are applied to, making them detectable to those who know what to look for. And so on.</blockquote>