Chemistry of Essential Oils

CONIFERS 27

pinene is also present. Zelinski and Alexandroff^1 isolated a highly
laevo-rotatory hydrocarbon [OJD = - 70° 45', which they believed to be
laevo-pinene, but Schindelmeiser^2 has shown it to be Zaevo-camphene
contaminated with some impurity. Acetone and a-terpineol have been
found in some samples of Eussian turpentine oil.
According to Schkatelow
8
the following trees yield " Eussian " turpen-
tine oils, having the following characters:—

Pinus Sylvestris

„ Abies

(Abies excelsa)

Larix Sibirica.

Pinus Cembra

,, Taurica

Abies Sibirica

Field of Oil.

15 to 16 per cent.

13-4

14-1

6

20

28

[«JD.

+ 22° to + 24°

• 13-2°


• 14-3°

• 14-04°
  
  
  • 75-9°
  
  
  
  

• 35-6°

Specific Gravity.

0-867 at 15°

0-873 „ 15°

0-870 „ 19°

0-865 „ 15°

0-861 „ 19°

0-875 „ 19°

The oil of turpentine arriving on this market from Eussia does not
correspond in character wjth any of the above oils. This is due to two
facts; firstly, that the oil is a mixture derived from more than one species,
and, secondly, that the bulk of the exported oil has been deprived of its
" middle runnings " in Eussia, the so purified middle fractions being used
in the country, so that much of the Eussian turpentine as we know it is-
a fractionated oil. The author
4
has examined samples of pure unfraction-
ated Eussian turpentine supplied to him by Prof. Schindelmeiser, and
found them to contain over 60 per cent, of oil distilling between 155° to
160°, which fractions are missing in nearly all the commercial oil ex-
ported. Two such typical samples had the following characters:—

Specific gravity

Optical rotation

Befractive index

Absorbed by 5 per cent. KOH

Distilled below 155°

155° to 160°

160° „ 165°

165° „ 170°

170° „ 180°

above 189°

1.

0-b67

+ 7°50'

1-4718

5 per cent,

traces only

65 per cent.

H „

13 „

7-5 „

3-5 „

2.

0-865

+ 10°

1-4736

6 per cent,
traces only
63 per cent.
9
15 „
7 „
Sample No. 1, after removal of the acid bodies and tarry matter, gave6 „
a rectified turpentine oil having the following characters :—

Specific gravity.

Opt-..-*...'+8°ical rotation.

Refractive index.

Absorbed by KOH

Disbils below 155°

155° to 160°

160° „ 165°

165° „ 170°

170° „ 180°

above 180°

0*8646

+ 8°

1-4890

none

none

68 per cent.

13 „

10 „

7

2 „

(^1) Chemiker Zeitung, 1902 (26), 1224. 2 Chem. Zentralblatt, 1908 (1), 2097.
*Moniteur Scwntifique, 4 1908, iv., 22, i., 217.
Chemist and Druggist, 26 October, 1912,