We're throwing it back old school and discussing Socrates' state-ordered suicide by hemlock. Was he actually killed with hemlock, as Plato described, or was something else going on?

1. Plato, Euthyphro, The Apology, Crito, Phaedo. In The Last Days of Socrates, Radice, B., Ed. Penguin Books: New York, 1969.

2. Hughes, B., The Hemlock Cup. Alfred A. Knopf: New York, 2011.

3. Brickhouse, T. C.; Smith, N. D., The Trial and Execution of Socrates. Oxford University Press: Oxford, 2002.

4. Bonner, R. J., The use of hemlock for capital punishment. Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 1940, 51, 299-302.

5. Goldfrank's Toxicologic Emergencies. Tenth ed.; McGraw-Hill Education: New York, 2015.

6. Konca, C.;  Kahramaner, Z.;  Bosnak, M.; Kocamaz, H., Hemlock (Conium Maculatum) poisoning in a child. Turk J Emerg Med 2014, 14 (1), 34-36.

7. Boskabadi, J.;  Askari, Z.;  Zakariaei, Z.;  Mahdi, F.; Tabaripour, R., Mild-to-severe poisoning due to Conium maculatum as toxic herb: A case series. Clin Case Rep 2021, 9, 5.

8. Erenler, A. K.;  Baydin, A.;  Duran, L.;  Yardan, T.; Turkoz, B., A case of respiratory failure due to poison hemlock poisoning presented to an emergency department. Hong Kong J. Emerg. Med. 2011, 18 (4), 235-238.

9. Hotti, H.; Rischer, H., The killer of Socrates: Coniine and related alkaloids in the plant kingdom. Molecules 2017, 22 (1962), 23.