The mandrake is so called from the German Mandragen, 'resembling man'—at least, so says Mr. Thiselton-Dyer; but this derivation is not quite satisfactory. The botanical name is Mandragora officinalis, and sometimes the May-apple, or Podophyllum peltatum, is also called mandrake; but the actual plant of fact and fancy belongs to the Solanum, or potato family.
Although one may doubt if the English name be really derived from the German Mandragen, it is certain that the Germans have long regarded the plant as something uncanny. Other names which they have for it are Zauberwurzel, or Sorcerer's Root, and Hexenmännchen, or Witch's Mannikin, while they made little dolls or idols from it, which they regarded with superstitious veneration, and called Erdmann, or Earth-man.
Yet in other places, according to one authority, the mandrake was popularly supposed to be 'perpetually watched over by Satan; and if it be pulled up at certain holy times and with certain invocations, the evil spirit will appear to do the bidding of the practitioner.' A superstition once common in the South of England was that the mandrake had a human heart at its root, and, according to Timbs, it was generally believed that the person who pulled it would instantaneously fall dead; that the root shrieked or groaned whenever separated from the earth; and that whoever heard the shriek would either die shortly afterwards or become afflicted with madness.
To this last superstition there is direct reference made by Shakespeare in Romeo and Juliet:
'And shrieks like mandrakes torn out of the earth,
That living mortals hearing them run mad.'
Frequent allusions to this superstition are to be found in the old poets, although it is held by some that the effects claimed for decoctions of the mandrake really refer to those of the nightshade. This confusion has certainly arisen at times, but the most general idea concerning the mandrake was that it was a stimulant rather than a narcotic. It is true that Shakespeare regarded mandragora as an opiate, for he makes Cleopatra to exclaim:
'Give me to drink mandragora,
That I might sleep out this great gap of time
My Antony is away.'
And, again, when in Othello he makes Iago say:
'Nor poppy, nor mandragora,
Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world
Can ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep
Which thou owedst yesterday.'
But, on the other hand, we find Apuleius—himself, by the way, not unsuspected of magical arts—writing that when the root of the mandrake is steeped in wine it produces vehement intoxication. The same idea is reflected in Mrs. Browning's Dead Pan: