Notation 2016, No.3 »The Mandrake«

Taken from Paul Christian's The History and Practice of Magic (first published in France in 1870):
„Would you like to make a Mandragora, as powerful as the homunculus (little man in a bottle) so praised by Paracelsus? Then find a root of the plant called bryony. Take it out of the ground on a Monday (the day of the moon), a little time after the vernal equinox. Cut off the ends of the root and bury it at night in some country churchyard in a dead man's grave. For 30 days, water it with cow's milk in which three bats have been drowned. When the 31st day arrives, take out the root in the middle of the night and dry it in an oven heated with branches of verbena; then wrap it up in a piece of a dead man's winding-sheet and carry it with you everywhere.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616):
…from Othello:
„Not poppy, nor mandragora,
Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world,
Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep
Which thou owedst yesterday."

…from Antony and Cleopatra:
"Give me to drink mandragora ...
That I might sleep out this great gap of time
My Antony is away."

…King Henry VI part II:
"Shrieks like mandrakes' torn out of the earth."
Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet IV.iii
"Would curses kill, as doth the mandrake's groan"

Samuel Beckett (1906 - 1989)
…from Waiting For Godot: "Let's hang ourselves immediately!"
"It'd give us an erection!"
"An erection!"
"With all that follows—where it falls, Mandrakes grow, that's why they shriek when you pull them up. Did you not know that?"

…from the novel Molloy: "I tried to remember the name of the plant that springs from the ejaculations of the hanged and shrieks when plucked."

Featured

Mandrake – Beliefs and Practices I

Many superstitious beliefs and practices are connected with temporary blindness and the perception of foreign sounds which remembers at a vivid voice: Close your eyes and listen to the whisper of the wind in the trees or murmur of the roots under the ground.

Mandrake – Beliefs and Practices II

Reports of the effects of consumption of mandrake are blurred vision, dilation of the pupils, dryness of the mouth, difficulty in urinating, dizziness, headache, vomiting, blushing and a rapid heart rate as well as hyperactivity and hallucinations.

Mandrake – the Bible , Genesis 30:14,15

„And Reuben went in the days of wheat harvest, and found mandrakes in the field, and brought them unto his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to Leah, Give me, I pray thee, of thy son's mandrakes.
And she said unto her, Is it a small matter that thou hast taken my husband? and wouldest thou take away my son's mandrakes also? And Rachel said, Therefore he shall lie with thee to night for thy son's mandrakes."

Mandrake – the Bible , Genesis 30:16

"And Jacob came out of the field in the evening, and Leah went out to meet him, and said, Thou must come in unto me; for surely I have hired thee with my son's mandrakes. And he lay with her that night.“

Pulling the Mandrakes

Josephus (circa 37–100 AD) of Jerusalem gives the practical directions for pulling the mandrakes up:
„A furrow must be dug around the root until its lower part is exposed, then a dog is tied to it, after which the person tying the dog must get away. The dog then endeavours to follow him, and so easily pulls up the root, but dies suddenly instead of his master. After this, the root can be handled without fear.“

"Let's hang ourselves immediately!"

DrawingTCTomaso Carnetto1 May 2016