MANDRAKE

28th January 2024

Photo Credit: DianaAmster (Getty Images), CANVA

QUOTATION

Could curses kill, as doth the mandrake’s groan,

I would invent as bitter searching terms,

As curst, as hard and as horrible to hear,

Delivered strongly through my fixed teeth,

With full as many signs of deadly hate,

As lean-faced Envy in her loathsome cave.

SUFFOLK: Henry VI, Part 2, Act 3, Scene 2

MANDRAKE/MANDRAGORA (Mandragora officinarum)

Shakespeare uses the ancient legends associated with the dangers of pulling the Mandrake root from the earth in Suffolk’s speech. He also alludes to the medicinal qualities of Mandrake as a sleeping aid in Othello, and the resemblance of the root to the human figure as an insult in Henry IV, Part 2.

Mandrakes have been used as both medicine and poison since antiquity. The use of the Mandrake as an aphrodisiac or aid to conception by Rachel and Leah was known through the Bible, Genesis 30. Mandrakes were also well known through Greek and Roman writers. The roots were supposed to resemble a human figure and there were legends that when a Mandrake root was pulled from the ground it gave a fatal shriek to the person gathering it.

John Gerard has much to say on the subject in 1597, ‘there have been many ridiculous tales brought up of this plant, whether of old wives, or some runnagate Surgeons and Physick mongers… They adde further, that it is never or very seldome to be found growing naturally but under a gallows…that he who would take up a plant thereof must tie a dog thereunto to pull it up, which would give a great shreeke at the digging up; otherwise if a man should do it he should surely die in short space after… All of which dreams and old wives tales you shall from henceforth cast out of your books and memory; knowing this, that they are all and everie part of them false and most untrue: for I myself and my servants also have digged up, planted and replanted very many, and yet never could either perceive shape of man or woman’.

Mandrakes are native to South East Europe and parts of the Eastern Mediterranean although they were also widely cultivated in other countries. Mandrakes belong to the Nightshade family (SOLANACEAE) along with Potatoes and Tomatoes. There are 2 species known from the Mediterranean region. Mandragora officinarum and Autumn Mandrake (Mandragora autumnalis). Mandrake has a rosette of leaves, lilac or purple flowers and yellow or orange fruits, sometimes called ‘apples’. Mandrakes contain high levels of alkaloids which can be highly poisonous.

More Information

Folger Shakespeare: Search Shakespeare’s Works

Geneva Bible 1599 edition: accesed via Bible Gateway

John Gerard 1597 The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1636 edition accessed via Archive.org)

Kew Plants of the World Online: Mandragora officinarum