Salem, Massachusetts. On Halloween weekend, it is the global capital of modern witchcraft. The event summons witches from all over to pay their dues in the historical seaside town as if on pilgrimage. Tourists watch and open their wallets to any charlatan with tarot cards and a table. But the establishments along the town’s main roads are legitimate institutions in a longstanding tradition of witchcraft. They sell herbs and crystals, pentagrams and tarots, potions and spells, books of instruction and anthologies of lore. Window shopping here is a magical experience, but one staple of the occult tradition is nowhere to be found. Mandrake root.
Made famous by the fantastical world of JK Rowling, the mandrake is a plant with a rather curious root. The root curls around itself forming limb-like structures, sometimes resembling humans. The bark of this root, its juice, and the leaves of its plant all have medicinal and magical properties. The screaming root is not Dumbledore fiction at all, rather Rowling took the idea from actual European witch lore. For thousands of years, doctors and witches held the root in high esteem and, yes, they stuffed their ears with cotton lest they bleed from the screams.
The mandrake is a Eurasian plant of the genus Mandragora. It grows naturally in the Mediterranean world and entered the realm of human consumption thanks to its chemical properties. Within the plant, tropane alkaloid compounds exist with names like scopolamine, hyoscyamine, Belladonnine, and the plant’s namesake, mandragorin. These chemicals interfere with the human’s nervous system and can reduce pain and cause hallucinations. But too much of the plant is fatal.
Thousands of years ago, humans honed in on the physical properties of this plant and used it medicinally. The Bible mentions it in the context of fertility. Ancient people along the Mediterranean would make plasters with flour and the leaves to sooth inflamed or itchy skin. When ingested, it acted as a reliable soporific and was used as an anesthetic in surgical contexts. Hippocrates, the guy from the doctor’s oath, prescribed mandrake for inflammation of the anus. (Randolph) It was even used on snake bites.
Within the classical civilizations of the Mediterranean, there were those who made and consumed wine infused with mandrake. Dioscorides, who documented the medicines of the first century C.E., recorded that sleeplessness and pain were dosed with a concentrated version of wine and mandrake root boiled down to one third of its volume. A similar concoction used the peel of the root and infused it into wine without heat.
Ancient stories about this mandrake wine and its effects paint a potent picture. An Egyptian papyrus from around 300 BCE gives a sleeping medicine recipe including wine, ivy, henbane and mandrake. (Monadi) A first century CE book by Sextus Julius Frontinus on war stratagems writes “Of Ambushes.”
Maharbal [officer to the famous Hannibal], being sent General against the Rebellious Africans, knew that they were greedy of Wine; He therefore caused a Vessel of Wine to be seasoned with Mandrake, that hath a stupifying Virtue next to Poison. Afterwards, when he came to skirmish a little with the Enemy, he sounded a Retreat out of design, and in the dead of the night, having left in his Camp some of his Baggage and all his Wine, poisoned with that Ingredient, he pretended to fly. When the barbarous Enemy had taken his Camp, they gave themselves over to rejoycing, and to drink freely of the poisoned Wine; which caused them to lye on the Ground stupefied as dead. At that Instant Maharbal returned with his Army, took and slew them without resistance. [sic]
Polyaenus tells a similar story of Caesar and how he escaped capture by some pirates who also enjoyed the fateful wine. The root’s reputation was so strong, that Plutarch notes, “where the mandrake grows near the vine and so communicates something of its force thereto, the wine that is made of its grapes makes the sleep of those that drink it more refreshing.”
While medicine welcomed the plant in Classical times, folk belief took hold as the Middle Ages descended across Europe. Strange myths and practices developed regarding both the plant’s consumption and the means of obtaining it in the first place. Ancient authors writing nearly 2,000 years ago instructed that three circles had to be drawn around a mandrake before uprooting it. (Randolph) The person digging the root had to stand to the west. More extreme, there was a belief that death would follow whoever uprooted the mandrake. To avoid this, those seeking the mandrake tied a dog’s tail to the stem and encouraged it with meat. Supposedly, the dog died and sometimes enjoyed a sacrificial burial. (Randolph)
The efforts that individuals went through were worth it–at least they thought so. The root was a talisman and a cure. Europeans during the Middle Ages collected the bodacious roots and treated them as people, dressing and clothing them in pursuit of good fortune. The roots could cure sterility, attract riches and luck, and obtain the love of another. Buried treasures were no match for the mandrake’s ability of discovery.
Sex, above all else, was the center of the mandrake’s intrigue. One species, Mandragora autumnalis, was considered female, so women used it to heal their sex organs. The male plant, Mandragora vernalis, was used by men for the same purpose. Both were aphrodisiacs. Machiavelli wrote a play in the 1500s titled La Mandragola which describes the seduction of a woman by using mandrake.
All of these beliefs collided squarely with Christianity. Obtaining the love of another with a root was pagan at best, dark magic at worst. The mandrake became Satan’s apple. Medieval witches were rumored to collect the mandrake on the grounds of the hangman’s gallows. (Hanus) They used the root in their potions–particularly potions for flying. Yet, by the 16th century, the root’s popularity began decreasing. Today, it is nearly impossible to find.
Which brings us back to Salem, Massachusetts. Not a mandrake to be found, well at least not mandragora. One herbalist’s shop does offer up the American Mandrake (scientific name Podophyllum peltatum, also poisonous), but it is a different plant entirely. Asking around the shops, no one knows where real mandrake can be obtained. Most suggest that you grow it yourself. While the root is no longer at the heart of the witch community here in Salem, it is not altogether lost.
In the Baztan Valley of Navarra, the northern, mountainous region of Spain, one company has been making mandrake liquor since the 1990s. In 1999, the region’s tourist authority commissioned the producer to replicate a traditional recipe. Already, the region was soaked in other traditional Navarran liquors including patxarán made with sloe berries and patxaka made with wild apples. The region’s famed infusions are made by macerating the fruits, and in the case of mandrake, the roots, in liquor.
So how did mandrake liquor end up resurfacing in the north of Spain? The people of the Baztan Valley know it to be part of their heritage, one that involved witchcraft. In the nearby town of Zugarramurdi, legend has it that there are caves that were once the haunts of witches. The witches of Zugarramurdi used to brew a mandrake liquor in order to fly on their dark sabbath, Akelarre, a word meaning male goat in Basque.
To make the liquor today, the craftspeople at Ordoki Vinos y Licores purchase mandrake because it is so hard to come by. They pick off its berries and leaves–only the root will go into the stainless steel tank for infusion. While the magical stories of yore certainly influence its modern production, Ordoki Licores suggests that Mandragora be taken as a shot after dinner, not for flight, just for digestion. Fortunately, the concentration of mandrake is so low in the liquor that it poses no threat to the drinker.
There is also some evidence that people in the Jordanian highlands sip tea made from the mandrake leaf when they have a cough. (Mondadi) In the Arab speaking world, the plant is called the Genie’s eggs or testicles (Dafni). Even in these modern contexts, communities that use the ancient herb and consume it as a drink, continue to feel the influence of witchcraft and magic. No one should endeavor to drink the juice of the mandrake, for what follows can only worthy of the plant’s dark reputation.
Apuleius, Barbarus, et al. Herbarium. [Rome, Joannes Philippus de Lignamine, 1481] Pdf. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/55000771/>.
Dafni, Amots, Saleh Aqil Khatib, and Guillermo Benítez. “The Doctrine of Signatures in Israel—Revision and Spatiotemporal Patterns.” Plants 10.7 (2021): 1346.
Frontinus, Sextus Julius. The stratagems of war, or, A collection of the most celebrated practices and wise sayings of the great generals in former ages written by Sextus Julius Frontinus, one of the Roman consuls ; now English’d, and enlarged with a new collection of the most noted strategems and brave exploits of famous and modern generals … by M.D.A. (Ann Arbor: Text Creation Partnership, 2011.) https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo2/B21037.0001.001?view=toc.
“Guía Para Conocer y Comprar El Licor Mandrágora Ordoki.” De Vins Menorca – Distribución y Venta De Vinos, Destilados y Licores, https://www.devinsmenorca.com/es/blog/post/guia-para-conocer-y-comprar-el-licor-mandragora-ordoki/5#:~:text=Gu%C3%ADa%20para%20conocer%20y%20comprar%20el%20licor%20Mandr%C3%A1gora,poco%20mejor%20a%20su%20productor%20y%20sus%20licores.
Guerrino, Antonio Alberto. Historia de la mandrágora. Publicaciones Médicas Biohorm, 1969.
Hanuš, Lumír O., et al. “Substances isolated from Mandragora species.” Phytochemistry 66.20 (2005): 2408-2417.
Hiscox & Co. Parker’s ginger tonic. … Dyspepsia. Heartburn. Cramps. … The best health and strength restorer ever used. … Hiscon & Co. Manufacturing chemists … New York. .. s.n., between 1870 and 1900?, 1870. Readex: Readex AllSearch, infoweb.newsbank.com/apps/readex/doc?p=ARDX&docref=image/v2%3A10D2F64C960591AE%40EAIX-10F4559C670DD168%4028893-10F0A3EFC1570098%402. Accessed 15 Nov. 2022.
Janick, Jules, M-Christin Daunay, and Harry Paris. “Tacuinum Sanitatis: medieval horticulture and health.” ASHS Annual Conference. 2009.
Monadi, Taha, et al. “A Comprehensive Review on the Ethnopharmacology, Phytochemistry, Pharmacology, and Toxicology of the Mandragora Genus; from Folk Medicine to Modern Medicine.” Current Pharmaceutical Design 27.34 (2021): 3609-3637.
Plutarch, Plutarch. The Morals, vol. 2. Little, Brown, and Company, 1878.
Randolph, Charles Brewster. “The Mandragora of the Ancients in Folk-lore and Medicine.” Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Vol. 40. No. 12. American Academy of Arts & Sciences, 1905.
Simple sugars from fruit juices can spontaneously ferment without the addition of anything thanks to natural yeasts in the air. Starchier foods that we produce in much larger quantities, however, will not ferment without some help. Before specific yeasts and bacteria were isolated and reproduced in fermentations that were able to break down starches into simple sugars, saliva was our only option.
We pass the bottle around the fire, swigging happily and reveling in the burning sensation that the liquor gives the throat. Soon, we are laughing at the wind and our bodies warm up to the idea of sleeping on the side of this volcano. We look from the fiery peak of Fuego to the clear bottle glimmering red in our campfire.
While New Englanders relied on their infamous cold to strengthen their applejack, the neighboring Mid Atlantic states, particularly New York and New Jersey, were famous for their distilled applejack. Unlike New England’s frozen drink which was homemade and home-consumed, New Yorkers made big business with their apple brandy. A 1903 newspaper reported that Orange County, New York paid more in excise tax on distilled fruit than any other state in the Union.
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